Gustavo Sumpta
In 1974, after years of civil war, the Portuguese and their descendants fled the colony of Angola where independentist groups gradually claimed their territory back. A tribal girl discovers love and death when her path crosses that of a young Portuguese soldier. Meanwhile, another group of Portuguese soldiers is barracked inside an infinite wall from which they will have to escape once the past comes out of the grave to claim its long-awaited justice.
A delirious sci-fi riff on the Arabian Nights' 'Tale of the Hunchback', that submerges us in a technological dystopia reigned by Dalaya.com, a mega-corporation that forces its employees to 'relax' at company-run medieval reenactments.
After the Portuguese government demolishes his slum and relocates him to a housing project on the outskirts of Lisbon, 75-year-old Cape Verde immigrant Ventura wanders between his new and old homes, reconnecting with people from his past.
The way in which we cross, one time only, the space of a public swimming pool reminds us of life, from birth until the end.
A man is standing at the window, holding a chair. There are wafts of street noise, and occasionally the curtain flutters. A dog is barking. Then, elegiac music sets in, a lavish string arrangement, joined by Billy Holidays love-torn, tragic voice. She is singing «The End of a Love Affair», and the entire agony of the end of her life resonates in it. The man at the window has meanwhile sat down on his chair, and the sad insistence of the song portrays his emotions. Is there something like the ghost of a smile flitting over his face? «And the smile on my face isnt really a smile at all», Holiday sings, and in the end all that is proven is the manipulative power of the combination of image and sound.
A historical classic drama in three acts, retold after an original prologue about dreams and nightmares of the thirteen-year-old noble heroine, Maria de Noronha.
Short film that takes us to a very recent past, that is still the present in some regions of Portugal, talking about love and betrayal, rage and regret.
"I've been on this cliff for almost a year, here on the lookout. Always aware of the sea and the enemy, even though I've never seen him. The man riding a horse gave me a new order, to be even more on alert, waiting for a mirage, for a ghost that will not come."
