The film documents the everyday life of Lourenço Marques during the seven days of the week. After interviewing a series of passers-by in downtown Lisbon on what they knew about Lourenço Marques, the film included fiction sequences featuring the mixed-race woman Catembe. The Ministry of Overseas imposed a cut of 19’ of the 87’ that prompted a second, documentary version of only 45’, which was in turn forbidden by the Censorship Commission.
Session in the presence of Faria de Almeida (director of the film).
Screening followed by Debate
Cuts – on what they conceal and reveal
The Estado Novo censorship mutilated numerous films and may have explicitly or implicitly prevented the making of many others, namely about the Portuguese colonies of the time and about the war. Catembe, in particular, was screened as a fiction film, chopped up to the point of not making sense, reinvented as a documentary film, and then forbidden. It offers a unique opportunity to reflect upon that history, by confronting the film with its cuts.
Debate in the presence of Maria do Carmo Piçarra (professor and researcher) and Manuel Mozos (director), and moderated by Amarante Abramovici (Doclisboa programmer and curator of The Colonial Question Retrospective).
During Estado Novo, the sea had a major role in the making of an idea of colonial empire. Its cinematic representation is one of the most complex readings of a moving images history, where what stays off screen often reveals what one sought to impose, state or expose, which was plenty. Doclisboa and the FILMar project partner in a programme around those representations, thinking about the necessary programming and framing ways to insert those films into contemporary rhetoric.
This session takes place in the scope of the project FILMar, which is carried out by Cinemateca Portuguesa – Museu do Cinema, with the support of the Financial Mechanism EEA Grants 2020-2024.
