EMBARGO, directed by António Ferreira

I went to the Pictures yesterday, to watch a low budget movie based on a twelve page short story by José Saramago, a movie with no distributing company, by a director who spent the rest of the money in an optimistic attempt to publicize the film. And that was all I knew of it. I bought the tickets, we entered on schedule. There were two of us, but back there, in the projecting room, they probably thought we were none, such was improbable the idea that someone might be interested in watching it. We realized it, because the lights remained on, to prevent perhaps darkness from haunting an empty space. There came the adds to dazzle chairs that were supposed to be empty. The credits were showed in the most original way I’ve seen so far, or one of the most. And so began one of the finest moments in the history of my love affair with Cinema. I won’t tell the story, because the amazing crew and cast who built this film deserve to have the next viewers overwhelmed, as we were – cured from the slight scepticism in which we started this adventure. Naturally, twelve pages are hardly sufficient to support an eighty minute film, so dialogs had to be invented specially for it, as well as a number of alterations that sidetracked the purpose and the way of the original story. One is an artist when one creates from scratch, but one is also an artist when one adapts and alters. And Tiago Sousa and António Ferreira are artists indeed. Artists that dominate aesthetics, artists that think, complete artists that understand the need of coherence, who dare to loose that coherence when art demands it or life impersonated looses it. A film in the style of magic realism, a work of art in sepia that only gave back my gift of speech when I answered the apologetic usher who came and peeped twice amazed to find people watching. The room finally became dark, but our souls were on fire.

Crew:
Directed by António Ferreira
Script by Tiago Sousa
Based on a short story by José Saramago
Cast:
Filipe Costa (Nuno)Cláudia Carvalho (Margarida)Pedro Diogo (Sérgio)Fernando Taborda (Sr. Alves)José Raposo (Patrão)Miguel Lança (Jovem Empresário)Eloy Monteiro (Dr. Vitor)