Essential Portuguese Films
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23 titles
- DirectorManoel de OliveiraA documentary that looks at the people working in the river Douro, around the city of Porto.
- DirectorAntónio Lopes RibeiroStarsVasco SantanaFrancisco RibeiroLeonor MaiaFrancisco, salesman in a shoe store, is totally in love with Tatão, which sells perfume in the same street. But he is an amateur theater actor, as she hates theater and is a fan of cinema. Will this unlikely love endure?
- DirectorManoel de OliveiraStarsNascimento FernandesVital dos SantosAntónio PalmaThe story takes place in the old streets of Porto and by the banks of the Douro River. A gang of very young kids has just accepted a new member, Carlitos, a shy boy who has "played it tough" by stealing a doll in a shop. Carlitos soon has a crush on Terezinha, the only girl in the group. The trouble is that Eduardo, the gang boss, is also in love with the pretty girl. And he will not allow any rival to challenge him.
- DirectorFrancisco RibeiroStarsMaria das NevesVasco SantanaAntónio SilvaThis classic of Portuguese cinema depicts the friendships and rivalries of the inhabitants of a square in downtown Lisbon, where exists a spirit of familiarity between neighbors.
- DirectorPaulo RochaStarsRui GomesIsabel RuthRuy Furtado19-year-old Julio has just left the provinces to settle down in the outskirts of Lisbon. He lives in a poor area with his uncle Afonso and starts working as an apprentice shoemaker. At the shop he gets to know Ilda, a young housemaid and regular customer. Ilda is pretty, joyful, and modern, and Julio falls for her. The two young people, although very different from each other, embark on an idyll.
- StarsAntónio Sequeira LopesCristina HauserElsa WallencampA story about doomed love between two people from different worlds and the impact in their lives.
- DirectorJoão César MonteiroStarsManuela de FreitasLuís de Sousa CostaFrancisco DominguesFor his feature debut Monteiro creatively borrowed from traditional Portuguese legends to craft a series of echoing, parallel tales of young couples desperately escaping cruel false fathers, each couple on the run across different regions of the country and during increasingly contemporary time periods. A lyrical and profoundly cinematographic allegory with a glistening sharp political edge, Paths traces a pattern of repressive authority across Portuguese history while also pointing, with cautious optimism, towards the steady presence of youthful resistance. With its stunning choreography of landscape and use of a poetic, associative structure to evoke the longue durée of mythical time, Paths anticipates Monteiro's mid-career masterpiece Silvestre.
- DirectorManoel de OliveiraStarsTeresa MenezesDiogo DóriaMário BarrosoThe life of a young man, son of an English officer who lets himself become a prisoner of love resulting in fatalism and disgrace.
- DirectorJoão César MonteiroStarsMaria de MedeirosTeresa MadrugaLuís Miguel CintraThe daughters of a nobleman give shelter to a stranger. After that visit ends with a severed hand, the pilgrim takes on different identities to seek revenge. The nobleman goes missing and his youngest has to pose as a knight to save him.
- DirectorPaulo RochaStarsLuís Miguel CintraClara JoanaZita DuarteTheatrical drama influenced by the Portuguese medieval poem of the same name, about an island promised to Lusitanian warriors by the Goddess Venus.
- DirectorAlain TannerStarsBruno GanzTeresa MadrugaJulia VonderlinnA Swiss sailor abandons his post during a stopover in Lisbon and takes up residence in a small hotel in the city.
- StarsRuben de FreitasTeresa MadrugaFernando HeitorManuel's fantasy travel through Time goes from Long Ago (Episode 1 - O jardim proibido / Le Jardin interdit) through Now (Episode 2 - O pique-nique dos sonhos / Le Pique-nique des rêves), arriving in the Future (Episode 3 - A pequena champeã de xadrez / La Petite Championne d'échecs).
- DirectorPedro CostaStarsPedro HestnesNuno FerreiraInês de MedeirosVicente, seventeen, lives with brother Nino, ten-years-old, and his ailing father in a derelict house on the outskirts of the capital. They don't seem to remember their mother, and are very much attached to their father, despite his temper, and his frequent absences from home. One day, the father leaves for good, and Vicente and Nino swear to cover it up. It's their secret. Clara, the primary school assistant, is fascinatingly beautiful, and secretive, and (may be) she knows it aswel. There are other secrets, though: the origin of the money that appears at Vicente's house; the relationship between Vicente's well-to-do uncle and his girlfriend; the relationship between the four people who once played the cards together, and now can't stand each other.
- DirectorJosé Álvaro MoraisStarsFernando HeitorPaula GuedesLuís LucasSet four years after the Portuguese revolution and the simultaneous loss of the Portuguese empire in Africa, the story concerns a director who sells guns to finance his play.
- DirectorJoão César MonteiroStarsJoão César MonteiroManuela de FreitasRuy FurtadoLisbon, 1989. A middle-aged poor idiot, tormented by an illness, lives in a cheap room in a family boarding house, in the old section of the city's waterfront.
- DirectorManoel de OliveiraStarsLeonor SilveiraCécile Sanz de AlbaLuís Miguel CintraEma is a very attractive but innocent girl, so pretty that cars crash in her presence. Young marries Dr. Carlo Paiva, who she is not attracted to, but is her father's friend. They move to the Valley of Abraham. Carlo loves her, but decides to sleep in a separate room, to avoid waking Ema when he has to return late at night. With time she begins to feel unhappy about her marriage so, with all the freedom she has, she takes a lover.
- DirectorTeresa VillaverdeStarsMaria de MedeirosMarcello UrgegheEvgeniy SidikhinLisboa, Portugal, mid-1990s. Three brothers, a young woman and two young men, are living together, careless of the future, or even the present. They love each other, but one day they go separate ways. When Maria does need help, the three brothers will join again - but a trifle too late.
- DirectorMaria de MedeirosStarsStefano AccorsiMaria de MedeirosJoaquim de AlmeidaStory of the 1974 coup that overthrew the right-wing Portuguese dictatorship--which continued the fascist policies of long-time dictator Antonio Salazar--and of two young army captains who were involved in it.
- DirectorMiguel GomesStarsSónia BandeiraFábio OliveiraJoaquim CarvalhoDocu-drama about Portuguese social life in the countryside during the busy month of August
- DirectorMiguel Gonçalves MendesStarsJoão AfonsoÀngels BarcelóPilar del RíoA documentary on Nobel Prize Winner José Saramago and his feelings over his wife, his country and life, as a whole.
- StarsAdriano LuzMaria João BastosRicardo PereiraFollows a jealous countess, a wealthy businessman, and a young orphaned boy across Portugal, France, Italy and Brazil where they connect with a variety of mysterious individuals.
- DirectorGonçalo TochaStarsDídio PestanaGonçalo TochaDocumentary about the ordinary life of an isolated civilization in the middle of the ocean, on Corvo Island.
- DirectorMiguel GomesStarsTelmo ChurroMiguel GomesHortêncílio AquinaA restless retired woman teams up with her deceased neighbor's maid to seek out a man who has a secret connection to her past life as a farm owner at the foothill of Mount Tabu in Africa.