A total of 45 films integrate the selection of the International and National Competitions of the 31st edition of Curtas de Vila do Conde, sections marked by geographical diversity, variety of styles (fiction, documentary and animation), but also of possibilities and trends of cinema itself. Taking place from the 8th to the 16th of July, the festival in Vila Conde will once again place side by side the new works of renowned authors and emerging talents in world cinema.

On the veteran side, we highlight the national premieres of the most recent works by Lucrecia Martel (Camarera de Piso), Carla Simón (Carta a Mi Madre Para Mi Hijo), Antonin Peretjatko (Les Algues Maléfiques), Jean-Gabriel Périot (L'effort des Hommes) and the duo Benjamin de Burca and Bárbara Wagner (Fala da Terra). On the side of new authors, this will be an opportunity to discover the works of the French Sarah-Anaïs Desbenoit, the Egyptian Morad Mostafa, the French Julia Kowalski, the Chinese Zhang Dalei, the Franco-German Lucas Malbrun, the Italian Francesco Sossai and the Spanish Irati Gorostidi Agirretxe.

On a national level, a transversal look at the cinema being produced today, from the north to the south of the country. Works by António Pinhão Botelho, Basil da Cunha, David Ferreira, Dimitri Mihajlovic & Miguel Lima, Diogo Baldaia, Duarte Coimbra, Francisco Carvalho, Inês Teixeira, Mário Macedo & Vanja Vascarac, Marta Monteiro, Mónica Lima, Nuno Amorim, Pedro Bastos, Pedro Neves, Susana Abreu and Tomás Baltazar will be coming to Vila do Conde throughout the week. The programme of films produced in Portugal also includes a special session with the three short films that were part of the Fábrica de Realizadores - Norte de Portugal, screened in Cannes (The Thorn, by André Guiomar and Mya Kaplan; Maria, by Mário Macedo and Dornaz Hajiha; Seagulls Cut Through The Sky), by Mariana Bártolo and Guillermo Garcia Lopez), as well as the screenings, in the National Panorama session, of Pátio do Carrasco – The Damned Yard, by André Gil Mata, On That Day in Lisbon, by Daniel Blaufuks, and The Long Legged Man by Vítor Hugo Rocha.

Opening the festival, the national premiere of 20000 Bee Species, the first feature film by Estibaliz Urresola Solaguren, winner of the Silver Bear for Best Leading Actor at this year's Berlinale. A delicate and emotional narrative about family and identity, featuring a brilliant performance by Patricia López Arnaiz, to be screened on 8 July at 19:00. The film will have its commercial premiere on 20 July.

To close the festival, the return to Vila do Conde of a director whose work the festival has followed very closely. Ghost Portraits, Kleber Mendonça Filho's most recent creation, is a story of falling in love with a city, its changes and details, its cinemas and its people. A declaration of love for Recife that only cinema is capable of showing.

Integrated in the section Cinema Revisited (of which the focus on the work of Walerian Borowczyk had already been announced), FILMar and Curtas join to review the work of Augusto Cabrita (1923-1993), on the centenary of his birth. The programme integrates a set of film sessions, conversations and an exhibition, which highlight the dimensions of the attentive observer of the dialogue between the landscape, social and maritime, its transformation by human action and what can be kept of a vanishing memory.

Dedicated to celebrating and highlighting the work of young filmmakers, the New Voices section includes, this year, a look at the work of the Portuguese João Gonzalez – with a carte blanche that includes his films, some choices and the exhibition Ice Merchants: from Sub-Conscious to Screen – of the Spanish Estibaliz Urresola Solaguren and the pseudo-Marxist guerrilla media collective, Total Refusal.

Curtas Vila do Conde's programme also includes a special film programme and workshops dedicated to children and family audiences, as well as the school film competition Take One and the European Audience Award.

Already announced for this year's edition were the programmes centred on the works of Billy Roisz, Deborah Stratman and Radu Jude, as well as the two film-concerts integrating the Stereo section: Bohren & der Club of Gore x Le Révélateur, by Philippe Garrel (July 13, 11.30 p.m., Vila do Conde Municipal Theatre), and Miaux x Carnival of Souls, by Herk Harvey (July 14, 11.30 p.m., Vila do Conde Municipal Theatre), and the return to the stage of TURBO JUNK I. E. (July 10, 11.30 p.m., Vila do Conde Municipal Theatre).

OFFICIAL PROGRAMME

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