João Nicolau

Fragments of spaces, buildings and structures, memories and remains of past eras, places of work or leisure now inhabited by our memories alone, or really forgotten. Dead things or living proof of time, natural elements, and human predators themselves.

In a distant past, Léon and Elvira Berthelini, itinerant artists, make their living hopping from town to town. In Covarronca, harassed by the Police Commissioner, they are forced to spend the night out in the open. That’s when they meet Stubbs, a young Cambridge student, with whom they find shelter in the home of a painter at odds with his wife. In return for the hospitality, they remind their hosts that the love of art resolves the art of love. Meanwhile, an unusual curse sends them on absurd journeys into the 21st century, where the future of social security and of a rock band are at stake.

João is an indolent young man, whose life is desperately empty. Day after day he goes through the motions of duplicating keys in his tiny shop concealed in the basement of an obsolete nearly deserted shopping center. Some day, he hopes, the lady of his heart will come and order the key that will unlock his heart. Against all expectation, the miracle happens...

A ten year-old boy faces up to the struggles of life in a summer camp. It’s not easy to be ignored by the girl of his heart or seeing his dormitory vandalised by adolescent thugs. Fortunately, in the forest, the wild haggis insists on remaining out of sight.

An interpretation of the life of Francis of Assisi.

Tommaso and Arturo are on the run in a remote forest. They hunt for food, trying to survive and find their way through the lush nature. It’s quiet, almost peaceful, until the sound of gunshots… Many years later, this forest has a wolf problem. It’s here where Ariane discovers a strange hole in the ground. Could she be the woman referred to in the valley’s legends?

The Italian Rino Lupo directed some of the most important silent films of Portuguese cinema. Pedro Lino develops, in Lupo, an investigation about the director, discovering one of the mysteries that surrounded him, the year and place of his death.

The start of Luís Rovisco’s old age isn’t exactly cheerful. Already in his sixties, he’s still roaming the country by himself, carrying out his tasks — increasingly less real — as sales director for the company SegurVale. Sadness, resignation? Not with the songs Luís makes up behind the wheel, and that take over this film from start to finish.

Rita is fifteen and spends the summer between warm afternoons of teenage love and party nights with her friend Sara. From Portugal to the South Pacific, the pleasures of this routine will take a turn when the young girl visits the art show of a new neighbor in the local community.

Gigi is a rural policeman who works in a place where nothing ever happens… until a young woman commits suicide by throwing herself onto the tracks as a train passes.

A vibrant anthology of LGBTQ+ short films and music videos that delve into the complexities of youth, identity, and desire. This diverse collection showcases a range of cinematic voices—both emerging and established—exploring the exhilaration, vulnerability, and confusion of coming-of-age through stories that celebrate queer love, self-discovery, and the breaking of societal boundaries. Blending narrative shorts, experimental visuals, and music-driven pieces, the anthology offers an evocative, multifaceted portrait of innocence transformed.

A summer day in Italy. The camera follows the deaf-mute Giacomo and a childhood girlfriend Stefi closely – in the woods, by the river – without wanting to disrupt the mystery of their relationship, between restrained sensuality and childhood games.

The story of Maria, a woman betrayed by his companion, David, when he steals a sack of money and flees, taking refuge in the island of Pico. Furious and determined to avenge herself, she proposes to an Police Inspector, Lucas, to chase and to find David. However, David, on a visit to the island of Faial, falls in love with a local, Marina. Maria and Lucas look for David in the Azores, they cross with Mariana in Faial and the three will discover David in his house of the mountain, at the top of the Peak. In a final confrontation, as in a Greek tragedy, Mary and David adjust the accounts that fate has traced to them.

Obsessed with questions about his past, a bankrupt, white Brazilian filmmaker undertakes an epic journey from Brazil to Mozambique and Portugal. This melancholic fable mixes animation, live-action, voice-overs, genres, and continents to explore Brazil's colonial past.

In 1783, naturalist Alexandre Rodrigues Ferreira travelled to Amazonia. Centuries later, all that remains from his Philosophical Journey are the artifacts belonging the tribes he studied and the animals and plants he brought over to Portugal, evoking a distant Amazonia and an expedition that went on for nine years.

João Vuvu, lives alone in a house that requires regeneration but due to being alone he is unable to do the work. On his son's release from prison and João's ensuing deception triggers a series of somber events.

A family gathers to celebrate Christmas.

"Cape Verde is an archipelago situated 500km off the West Coast of Africa. On the island of Santiago lives Mano Mendi, the last player of the cimboa, a one-string violin used to accompany the traditional batuque music. Through the portrait of Mano Mendi and the learning experience of To, a music teacher in the capital city of Praia, the film shows us how this music is rooted in the rhythms of everyday life."

This is the way you hold the racket to play a forehand. Just move your arm back, the left shoulder facing the ball, step forward with your left foot, hitting the ball.”

Francisco, behave! I Know it's your birthday, you are thirty now, it's carnival, you've dressed as a cowboy for the school party and you are surrounded by kids you hate. But that's no reason to be so annoying... Francisco, repeat after me: "Up to your 30s you have the face God has given you. After that, you get the face you deserve".

What starts as an animal lab experiment leads, in the future, to the development of artificial beings capable of carrying out the most varied and complex of tasks. Before being delivered to their customers, the manufacturer develops a kind of final quality control test, supervised by a technician, where certain skills (like learning the customer’s language) are improved. This part of the process invariably occurs in a closed environment, usually a house with key characteristics of the customers home. Alpha is one of such artificial beings. He and Beta are a couple only a few weeks away from being shipped to their future owners in Japan.

Manuel bids farewell to his routine and boards a 15th century vessel under pirate law. Treason on board triggers a series of terrible events our protagonist overcomes while keeping his moral principles intact.

In this evocative story told ingeniously with minimal dialogue, men and women from various backgrounds and places each deal with the loss of a loved one.

A princess and a hunter. An iconographic journey immersed in Lusitanian fantasy.