André Silva Santos

It's last week at school, but Simon's not studying for his finals. His parents have divorced and seem to be waiting for a change that never comes. Simon gets tired of waiting. Could he get a one-way ticket to the USA? Would it be possible to make objects explode from afar? And what if time could be reversed? Or if freedom is only to be found in movies?

It's summer in Lisbon and Nicolau is an undecided boy. Among his doubts about the university course to follow and what kind of girl to choose for his girlfriend, Nicolau spends his days trying to figure out who he wants to be when he's bigger. The problem is, he's about to finish the secondary exams, he is already big, without having things clearer. From indecision to indecision, Nicolau navigates in sight, with the only compass for his possible choices being the girls he is going to fall in love and with those he imagine as many possible futures.

As the afternoon light fades, two kids play in the woods by a lake. When one of them disappears, the lake and its inhabitants take hold of the narrative and, when the darkness sets in, build up the walls of a maze that encircles the two kids. While one wanders through the forest searching for his friend, the silhouettes, textures and sounds of the forest slowly exert their mysterious grip.

When her mother dies, 40-year-old Helena now has time for herself after years of taking care of her family. She works at a film production company, dances boisterously, gets drunk. A quiet film about letting go morphs into a coming of middle age story.

When Edward’s search for his biological family leads him and his girlfriend Ryley to a magnificent villa high in the mountains of Northern Portugal, he is full of excitement at meeting his long-lost mother and twin brother. Finally, he will discover who he is and where he comes from. But nothing is as it seems, and Edward will soon learn that he is linked to them by a monstrous secret.

Early Spring. A sonata, a train, a letter. Between his work as a flute teacher and the rituals of mourning the early death of his wife, Samuel faces a dilemma after a visit from his brother.

Gabi believes in her ability to act in times of injustice, relying on her physical abilities. One day, Gabi finds out that her brother, Daniel, is a victim of bullying in their neighbourhood. Suffering from unexpected outbreaks of sleepwalking, he disappears from home during the night. While trying to avenge him, Gabi realizes that perhaps all the coinciding events related to her brother are a test made by ghosts of the past.

It’s springtime in Lisbon and Nicolau turns 24, but he’s not celebrating. Living in his parents’ house, hostage to a dream of being a musician that never comes true and plagued by the ideal image of an ex-girlfriend who left him a year ago and never came back, Nicolau feels incapable of moving forward and inventing a life of his own. He takes odd jobs until the day he discovers that his mother is just as dissatisfied with life as he is. Nicolau is shaken, but he doesn’t stumble.

A young couple takes care of a holiday condo in the desolate environment of an empty village. When the weather changes and the unexpected happens, they begin to drift further apart.

Images from my family archive remind me of a text by Borges. Little by little, I transform Averroes into my grandfather, my grandfather into Borges and Borges into me. In this movement, it becomes increasingly difficult to look at any of them without, too, glimpsing all the others.

In the middle of the Atlantic, Helena rekindles an old friendship with Ceu, an astrophysicist who recently relocated to the Azorean island of Santa Maria to study exoplanets. Caught between the island’s geological inheritance and the vastness of the cosmos, the two friends reconcile with the various space exploration infrastructures that are stationed on the island. A work of science-fiction inspired by the various space resources currently existing in Santa Maria, See You Later Space Island is a loose tale of friendship and endurance.

Alberto is 40 years old and lives with his mother in an apartment complex where he works as a concierge. One day, a circus group settles near Alberto’s residence, disturbing his everyday life and awakening his forgotten desire for independence and freedom.

It's a summer weekend in a country house near Sintra, in Portugal. Fourteen-year-old Nicolau is spending a couple of days with his older brother Simão and his friends, all of them in their late twenties. Everyone is drawn to the beautiful and quiet Maria do Mar, but Nicolau will see his life the most deeply shaken by her. Between homework and tree-climbing, stories about a deceased philandering grandfather and the origins of the tortellini's shape, a friend in a costume nursing a broken heart and seduction games, Nicolau observes this group of young adults.

Accompanied by two botanical guides, a group of hikers embarks on a journey through the enchanting landscapes of Arrábida Natural Park. As they traverse the park's diverse flora and fauna, they uncover evidence of a troubling transformation: rather than the work of nature, it becomes clear that human intervention is reshaping this once-pristine environment.

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.

Gonçalo and his friends set off on a mission to his deceased grandfather’s house, in the north of Portugal. There, the memories of the past open up new perspectives into the future.

The apparition of a bloodstain reaffirms the relentless cycle of life, filmed in all its fragility and complexity.

Pedro travels for the first time in one of the vans leading a group of workers to France. While, for the others, this is another work trip, each kilometer brings Pedro closer to a place that seduces him: the colossal mountains of the Alps.

One of the most far-reaching events in a human life is the birth of your baby. But life with a newborn can be so ordinary and at the same time all-embracing: the wash is drying in the corridor, the bathroom has to be cleaned. In the calm rhythm of the day, 'Ordinary Time' skims past authentic moments like this.