DOCUMENTARY FILM FESTIVAL-DOCLISBOA in Serralves
High School, Frederick Wiseman
Tribute to Wiseman
EUA, 1968, 75’, B&W, M/12
original version
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“High School” was filmed at a large urban high school in Philadelphia. The film documents how the school system exists not only to pass on ‘facts’ but also to transmit social values from one generation to another. In this documentary, Wiseman presents a series of formal and informal encounters between teachers, students, parents, and administrators through which the ideology and values of the school emerge. At one point, one disciplinarian lectures a minor offender: “We are out to establish that you are a man and that you can take orders.” Since 1991, “High School” has been kept in the National Film Registry and is cited by the Library of Congress of the United States as a National Treasure.
21 NOV 2008, 21:30End of the Rainbow, Robert Nugent
France, 2007, 83’, colour, M/12
original version, with english subtitles
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In a remote region of Guinea, West Africa, a desperately poor place with a long connection to gold, a large industrial gold mine has arrived. End of the Rainbow is an elegiac portrait of the changes brought by the mine, and of the universal human desire for a better life. How do local people respond to the opportunities and economic divisions the mine creates? How do the local jobseekers and expatriate staff, attracted by gold and the possibilities it offers, understand one another? When difficulties arise, the mine calls in the military. Conflict over the mine’s presence is escalating. The gold will be dug from the ground, but at what cost? End of the Rainbow reveals a world that is changing forever, and portrays intimately the people who are grappling to respond to those changes.
15:30
Women of Brokman, Isaac Isitan
Canada, 2007, 90’, colour, M/12
original version, with english subtitles
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In 2001, against the background of Argentina’s devastating economic collapse, a miraculous event occurred that quickly became a textbook case study for sociologists. A group of seamstresses at Brukman’s clothing factory responded to their supervisors’ abandonment of the plant by taking over the operation themselves. They soon reorganized the factory with a self-management business model, sans corporate hierarchy – nary a boss in sight. Isaac Isitan’s documentary The Women of Brukman observes these brave and determined workers over several years - a period that witnesses them fighting to get the business back on its feet, being unjustly booted out by authorities, and grappling with the law to reclaim their right to manage the business.
18:00
Queria Ser
Sílvia Firmino, Portugal, 2008, 55’, Colour, M/12
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A Primary School is at risk of closing in inland Portugal. Ten students, from first to fourth grade, share the same room. A film which sets out to reinforce a reading program, comes across the strength, ambitions and fears of these children.
21:30
Il resto di una Storia (The Rest of a Story), António Prata
Italy, Switzerland, 2007, 35’, colour, M/12
original version, with english subtitles
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A come back to Zurich after more than ten years, a city where the author personally experienced the years of the drug open scene. A backwards journey to let memories resurface and to come to terms with what is left of one’s past, essential condition in order to better understand oneself.
Must Read after My Dead, Morgan Dews
Morgan Dews, Spain, EUA, 2007, 74’, colour, M/12
original version
When a Connecticut couple turns to psychiatry for help with their marriage in 1960, things quickly spiral out of control. Allis and Charley submit themselves and their four children to a daily barrage of group and individual therapies. Pills are prescribed, the family tears apart. The family, as instructed by their doctors, record their discussions and fights. Smart, free-thinking Allis begins to question the therapy. Her diary tells a story of oppression, abuse and institutionalized misogyny. Preserved and hidden away for Allis’s children to discover after her death, the film uses this intimate material combined with home movies and an unusual soundtrack to viscerally reconstruct the family’s struggle and to comment on the mores of American culture in the ‘60s.
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23 NOV 2008, 21:30Bab Sebta
Pedro Pinho, Frederico Lobo, Portugal, 2008, 110’, Colour , M/12
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Bab Sebta means in arabic “the gateway to Ceuta” and is the name for the passage between Morocco and Ceuta. It is the place where those fleeing various parts of Africa converge to make their escape to Europe.This movie, Bab Sebta, travels through four cities to find these waiting travellers and hear what they have to say.
