
Experimental Shorts: The Act of Seeing
Synopsis
The seven short films in this program radically push towards new and singular forms of expression. Through the use of archival footage, historical recreation, and dreamlike narratives, these films grapple with the past and the future of cinema — and the world. Featuring works by Marisa Hoicka, Isadora Neves Marques, María Salafranca, Valentin Noujaïm, Chi Jang Yin, Alison McAlpine, and Kevin Jerome Everson.
Teen Girl Fantasy (Canada) is a poetic archival excavation of the complex cultural signals surrounding teen girlhood. In My Senses Are All I Have to Offer (As minhas sensações são tudo o que tenho para oferecer) (Portugal), Lourdes and her girlfriend Lana can communicate telepathically using “sensory pills.” Black Shadow (Negra sombra) (Cuba) is a delicate and deeply moving portrait of Maria, a griveing woman. In To Exist Under Permanent Suspicion (France), a woman has fantasies of burning the skyscraper in which she works. Newly discovered archival images of postwar Hiroshima mix with contemporary footage of the city in I Was There, Part II (U.S., Japan). In Perfectly a Strangeness (Canada, Chile) three donkeys wander an abandoned landscape and come upon an observatory. And Hazel (dual) (United States) is a dual-screen recreation of Eddie Hazel’s famous 10-minute guitar solo on the song “Maggot Brain” by Funkadelic.
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My Senses Are All I Have to Offer [short film] As minhas sensações são tudo o que tenho para oferecer
Synopsis
Lourdes and her girlfriend Lana can communicate telepathically using “sensory pills.” After dating for some time, Lourdes brings Lana to meet her parents at their country house, where they confront their relationship and the limits of their telepathy.
This film screens as part of the Experimental Shorts: The Act of Seeing program.
Film Credits
- Catarina de Sousa
- Isadora Neves Marques
- Isadora Neves Marques, Margarida Lucas
- Marta Simões
- Ágata de Pinho, Isadora Alves, Mário Afonso, Albano Jerónimo
- Fá Maria
- Catarina de Sousa, Isadora Neves Marques
- Foi Bonita a Festa

Grand Tour
Synopsis
1917. Edward, a skittish civil servant working for the British Empire, has been posted in Rangoon, Burma for years. When his fiancée Molly sends a letter announcing her imminent arrival, he experiences a sudden and debilitating case of cold feet, boards the first ship in sight, and flees the country. Learning of his escape, Molly is determined to track him down. So she embarks on an Asian grand tour, going from Bangkok to Shanghai in search of her reluctant lover. Equal parts 1930s Hollywood throwback and meditative travelog, director Miguel Gomes (The Tsugua Diaries, Chicago IFF 2020) imbues this globe-trotting love story with searching melancholy. The studio-set “colonial romance” is shot in black and white, and intercut with sumptuous color footage shot in the modern day. The result is an intoxicating mixture of fiction and documentary that ponders the past as it ruminates on our present.
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Media



Film Credits
- Filipa Reis
- Gonçalo Waddington, Crista Alfaiate, Cláudio da Silva
- Uma Pedra no Sapato, Vivo Film, Shellac Films
Sponsors
International Competition Program Patron
Jacolyn and John Bucksbaum Family Foundation

Synopsis
Nana is a young girl living on a remote volcanic island that much of her family, including her mother, have long since fled. When Nana falls ill to a strange fever, she is sent to the foot of the island’s volcano for treatment by the local healer. There, she encounters a world steeped in magical realism, suspended between dream and reality.
Hanami is a stunning, surreal look at family and community in Cabo Verde, an island nation whose diaspora far outnumbers its residents. Exploring the necessity of migration and the void it leaves behind, filmmaker Denise Fernandes paints a sweeping portrait of the inherited echoes between daughters and mothers — all set against the otherworldly landscape of Ilha do Fogo, Cabo Verde and its volcano.
Screenings & Events
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Film Credits
- Eugenia Mumenthaler, David Epiney, Luís Urbano, Sandro Aguilar
- Denise Fernandes, Telmo Churro
- Selin Dettwiler
- Alana Mejía González
- Sanaya Andrade, Daílma Mendes, Alice Da Luz, Nha Nha Rodrigues, Yuta Nakano
- Rahel Zimmermann
- Alina film, O Som e a Fúria
- https://www.alinafilm.com/hanami-eng
Sponsors
Black Perspectives Program Sponsor
New Directors Program Patron
Robert and Penelope Steiner Family Foundation