'A Sombra do Pai', by Gabriela Amaral Almeida
Within the programming of
Spectral Projections
In a turbulent home in São Paolo, a young girl turns to the supernatural while battling grief and grim familial and economic circumstances.
| Duration: | 1 hour 30 minutes |
The Father’s Shadow / A Sombra do Pai, directed by Gabriela Amaral Almeida. Brazil, 2018. 95'. Original soundtrack with Spanish subtitles
In the darkness of the night, Devla invokes her dead mother’s spirit and discovers the power of black magic, which takes her to the blurred frontier between life and death. This sudden transition to precocious maturity is illuminated by her instinctive quest for a way to assuage the family’s grief.
A brand of sorcery born of tragic or oppressive circumstances is a common narrative thread in several of the films that comprise the Spectral Projections programme. Feminist calls for empowerment are often at odds with objective or scientific reality. The protagonists seek paths outside the bounds of what is deemed right or acceptable. The otherworldly becomes preferable to the real world and must be summoned as an alternate road to improvement, transformation or healing.
Gabriela Amaral Almeida (Brazil, 1980) is a director, screenwriter and playwright. Her films present social issues and individual dramas in an atmosphere of horror. She studied Horror Cinema and Literature at UFBA (Brazil) and specialised in screenwriting at the Escuela Internacional de Cine y TV (EICTV) in Cuba. She has written scripts for fellow directors like Walter Salles, Cao Hamburger and Sergio Machado. As a director, she has authored the shorts Castaways / Náufragos (2010), co-directed with Matheus Rocha; One Spring / Uma Primavera (2011); The Comforting Hand / A Mão que Afaga (2012); Suit / Terno (2013), co-directed with Luana Demange; and Statue / Estátua (2014). The Father’s Shadow is the second feature film she has directed.
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