Showing posts with label portugal. Show all posts
Showing posts with label portugal. Show all posts

23 April 2014

Films set in Lisbon

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After The Night (Ate Ver A Luz) is a striking indie gangster story set in the gritty slums of Lisbon and is out in UK cinemas and VoD from the 25th April.

A visually striking film, it accurately shows Lisbon’s diverse culture, people and surroundings and climbs inside the world of Lisbon’s Creole slums.

We take a look back at a cinematic history of films set in Lisbon…

AFTER THE NIGHT (Ate Ver Luz; 2013; Basil Da Cunha)
An outcast living a solitary nocturnal life with an iguana named Dragon as his only friend, Sombra wanders around in the Creole slums of Lisbon as he is looking for cash to pay back the local gang boss. Dragged into an armed robbery, he runs away and is chased until the early hours of the day.


After The Night is out in cinemas and VoD from the 25th April (watch at I-Tunes)

A TALKING PICTURE (Um Filme Falado; 2004; Manoel de Oliveira)

For some thought-provoking, for others dull – this movie reveals the encounters of a mother and daughter on a Mediterranean cruise. John Malkovich is the captain.



IN VANDA'S ROOM (No Quarto da Vanda; 2000; Pedro Costa)

This award-winning, warts-and-all documentary/fiction provides a close-up of the lives of Cape Verdean slum dwellers and drug addicts in Lisbon’s deprived Fontainhas district.


THE LETTER (A Carta; 1999; Manoel de Oliveira)

Passion, futile love, adultery, tragedy, piety… It's all in this Oliveira classic that won the Jury prize at Cannes.


THE NINTH GATE (1999; Roman Polanski)

Stars Jonny Depp as a rare book dealer seeking out a supernatural demon text. In the course of his travels around Europe through France and Spain, to track down the authentic copy of the book for his client, he visits Sintra in Portugal. It's a picturesque area of Portugal just outside Lisbon with plenty of atmospheric hilltop palaces and castles.
Depp visits Chalet Biester with its turreted outline tucked into lush green woodland exuding mystery.


BONES (Ossos; 1997; Pedro Costa)

A grim and gripping tale of life in the slums on the outskirts of Lisbon, dealing with poverty, suicide and the struggle of love and death.


LISBON STORY (Viagem a Lisboa; 1994; Wim Wenders)

Inventive and beautifully photographed, this German drama follows director Monrow on his quest to finish a silent film in Lisbon. Stars Portuguese band Madredeus and a cameo by Manoel de Oliveira.


THE WINTER IN LISBON (El Invierno en Lisboa; 1992; Jose Antonio Zorrilla)

This crime drama is about a disillusioned US jazz pianist who fl ees to Lisbon where he befriends an artist. The film stars famous trumpet player Dizzy Gillespie.


After The Night is out in cinemas and on VoD from the 25th April

26 September 2012

Casa De Lava DVD Review

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★★1/2☆☆

Casa de Lava (called Down to Earth on it’s US relase) is a film made by noted Portuguese filmmaker Pedro Costa. It was his 2nd film and a very loose remake of Val Lewton/Jacques Tourneur’s I walked with a Zombie. It stars Isaah de Bankolé best known to western audiences with his many collaborations with Jim Jarmusch with films such as The Limits of Control and Ghost Dog: The Way of the Samurai.

The plot is basically an immigrant worker Leaõ in Portugal falls into a coma. A young depressed nurse Mariana has to get Leaõ back to his home in the volcanic Cape Verde islands. Nobody is willing to claim Leaõ and so this stuck on the island. She starts interacting (partly in hope of finding a relative) with the strange locals and is drawn into mysterious community of the volcanic island. She starts a relationship that never goes anywhere with a local, she seems to be more and more connected to Leaõ. Leaõ also eventually wakes up but is just a stranger in his own land. Many of the inhabitant’s wishes to make the journey to Portugal out of financial need because of Portugal’s colonisation of the island.

My biggest problem with the film is I just wish it were a total zombie film and not try be a zombie film without zombies. The Zombie film was always political and yes the people are of the island are kinda zombies and dead in a way. It however would have been more enjoyable if they were actual zombies. There are numerous shots of the volcanoes that are beautiful but they linger and linger and just bored the hell out of me eventually.

It has an interesting film about the colonisation of islands in Africa by the Portuguese in it for about 20 minutes. It however left be cold and I didn’t care at all about the characters, it left me unengaged with the characters. It was all done very realistically and I would have preferred a supernatural twist (instead of the metaphorical zombie), which Costa originally planned to do, as evident on the bonus interview on the Second Run DVD.


Ian Schultz

Rating:15
DVD Re-release Date: 24th September 2012(UK)
Directed by: Pedro Costa
Cast: Inês de Medeiros, Isaach De Bankolé, Edith Scob, Pedro Hestnes
Buy Casa De Lava: DVD[1994]

13 March 2010

The trailer for Portugese movie EMBARGO

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source TwitchFilm

If you love all thing absurd dark and damn right obscure ala Coen Brothers you should check out the trailer below for Portugese Movie EMBARGO.
The black comedy was directed by António Ferreira  and is about a hot dog salesman with an invention thats going to revolutionize the shoe industry but he has one one problem he's stuck in his car and cant get out. The Coens would love this script  but if this movie does well in its native Portugal dont be surprised if Hollywood comes knocking on the door and buys the rights to it.

enjoy the trailer which is after the offical synopsis.

Nuno is a man working at a hotdog stand, who also invented a machine which promises to revolutionize the shoe industry- a foot scanner. In the middle of a gasoline embargo and finding himself in a strange predicament, Nuno tries desparately to sell his machine, obsessing for the success that would help him get the things he wants out of life. When Nuno is mysteriously confined to his car, he misses the once in a lifetime chance to finally produce his invention, finding his life suddenly embargoed.



EMBARGO (TRAILER) - a film by António Ferreira - based upon the homonymous story by José Saramago from Zed Filmes on Vimeo.