Rui Alexandre Santos

Are even the best and brightest revolutionary movements doomed to inevitable compromise, betrayal and failure? That question haunts this documentary, a biography of Angolan-born Mário Pinto de Andrade (1928–1990), a key figure in African revolutionary and anti-colonial struggles.

Following the 1884–85 Berlin Conference resolution on the partition of Africa, the Portuguese army uses a talented ensign to register the effective occupation of the territory belonging to the Cuamato people, conquered in 1907, in the south of Angola. A STORY FROM AFRICA enlivens a rarely seen photographic archive through the tragic tale of Calipalula, the Cuamato nobleman essential to the unfolding of events in this Portuguese pacification campaign.

A journey into the life and work of beat poet and activist Bob Kaufman and his insistence that poetry is fundamental to humanity's moral survival.

Interweaving footage from the director’s three visits to North Korea with songs, spectacle, popular cinema and archival footage, Songs from the North takes a different look at this enigmatic country typically seen through the distorted lens of jingoistic propaganda and derisive satire. Challenging the meaning of freedom, love, patriotism and ultimately the human condition, it tries to understand, on their own terms, the psychology and popular imaginary of the North Korean people and the political ideology of absolute love which continues to drive the nation towards its uncertain future.

There is a long night when Hugo, a civil servant, is sitting on the stairs of the Ministry where he works. He can’t face going home. The images of the mysterious 8 mm films he found in António’s house after he passed away keep coming back to his mind. Hugo remembers the day when Antonio, his superior at the Ministry, told him that he was going to die. Indirectly, Antonio seemed to want to tell him something about Hugo himself. Hugo’s desire to understand what had remained unsaid between the two of them, triggers other memories from the past. Hugo unexpectedly thinks back on the last time he saw the woman he loved, Adriana, and relives once more what he feels has been his unlived life.

There is a long night when Hugo, a civil servant, is sitting on the stairs of the Ministry where he works. He can’t face going home. The images of the mysterious 8 mm films he found in António’s house after he passed away keep coming back to his mind. Hugo remembers the day when Antonio, his superior at the Ministry, told him that he was going to die. Indirectly, Antonio seemed to want to tell him something about Hugo himself. Hugo’s desire to understand what had remained unsaid between the two of them, triggers other memories from the past. Hugo unexpectedly thinks back on the last time he saw the woman he loved, Adriana, and relives once more what he feels has been his unlived life.

The film tells the story of a sister and a brother, Inês and Rafael. Since the divorce of their parents, their family never saw Rafael again. Inês runs away from home looking for him when she is told he is back at the Guincho Beach and surfing again. Rafael is an ex-surf champion who everyday gets himself inside the most dangerous waves to test the limits of his life. When the two brothers meet, Guincho makes them come together in a promise of paradise on earth, as it was the last place where their family lived together and in happiness. But Inês is surprised one day when she finds her brother looking fixedly to the Serra de Sintra mountain range, where the Convent of the Capuchos, which once was his refuge, is. She fears having brought him back the memories of the separation of their parents. Rafael is in a crisis of faith. When one day he disappears, Inês knows he went back to the convent, and she starts doing what she can to bring him back to her.

The film tells the story of a sister and a brother, Inês and Rafael. Since the divorce of their parents, their family never saw Rafael again. Inês runs away from home looking for him when she is told he is back at the Guincho Beach and surfing again. Rafael is an ex-surf champion who everyday gets himself inside the most dangerous waves to test the limits of his life. When the two brothers meet, Guincho makes them come together in a promise of paradise on earth, as it was the last place where their family lived together and in happiness. But Inês is surprised one day when she finds her brother looking fixedly to the Serra de Sintra mountain range, where the Convent of the Capuchos, which once was his refuge, is. She fears having brought him back the memories of the separation of their parents. Rafael is in a crisis of faith. When one day he disappears, Inês knows he went back to the convent, and she starts doing what she can to bring him back to her.

The film uses a collection of post-World War II black & white photographs to portray the dockworkers of Marseilles, many of whom were of African descent. Set in and around a 1947 strike protesting weapons shipments to the French in Indochina, the images evoke the life and work of Senegalese filmmaker, Ousmane Sembène, a former dockworker, and one of the founding figures of the New African Cinema of the 1960s.

“Rio do Ouro and Água-Izé were among the largest cocoa plantations in São Tomé and Príncipe during the Portuguese colonial era. Thousands were marked by forced labour equivalent to slavery. I return to my country to find the traces of that past.” — Silas Tiny