Catarina Mourão | Portugal, 2023, 64'
Martim, 58 years old, recalls his one and a half year stay in the Soviet Union in 1979. He was 15 years old and an "innocent" boy. His parents, Communist Party militants, thought he was going to a safe place, a society that fulfilled all their ideals. Martin travelled to Moscow, crossed the Volga delta by train to Astrakan on an initiatory journey. He fell in love several times, gave up his studies and became a clandestine. The communist ideal instilled by his parents was lost along the way. Forty years later, in this film, Martim decides to tell this story to his son for the first time, a story that has always been a family taboo.
Catarina Mourão studied music, law and film (MA at Bristol University and PhD at Edinburgh University, FCT scholarship in both). Founder of AporDoc (Association for the Portuguese Documentary). She teaches Cinema and Documentary since 1998 in various Masters Degrees. In 2000 she creates Laranja Azul with Catarina Alves Costa, an independent film production company. It is in this context that she directs her films which have always been awarded and shown in international festivals. Her main areas of research are documentary, memory, dream, archive and autobiography. Her film “A Toca do Lobo” was released theatrically all over Portugal and premiered at The Rotterdam International Film Festival.
