06/02/2025 - José Filipe Costa presents an impressive meditation on the maintenance of the status quo through a fictionalisation of a period in pre-revolution Portuguese history

They call him “Mr President”, even though he has fallen from power. José Filipe Costa presents, in the title text, all we need to know about the historical context upon which his IFFR-premiered new film, Our Father – The Last Days of a Dictator [+see also:
interview: José Filipe Costa
film profile], is built. In the years leading up to Portugal’s 25 April 1974 revolution and the downfall of the dictatorship, head of government António de Oliveira Salazar lived almost entirely bed-bound after suffering brain damage in 1968. Salazar helmed the authoritarian state for 36 years; after this incident, he was swiftly replaced but left to live in his designated home without being truly informed about no longer having any actual power.

From here, the filmmaker dramatises the fictionalisation: those around Salazar (Jorge Mota) resolved to ensure he continued to “rule” from his home, playing out a Truman Show-esque charade that he was still in power while they understood the world around them to be continuing on. The illusory, windowless enclosure is led by his devoted, strict and obsequious older housekeeper Maria (Catarina Avelar), who controls every aspect of the home with an iron fist and small acts of violence.

Maria is, in fact, Filipe Costa’s most fascinating construction. With droopy jowls and bags under her eyes, her visage is immediately reminiscent of a Basset Hound, although her emotionless look is also immensely terrifying. “Maria lives my life and protects me better than the police,” says Salazar. Others at the dinner table gleefully share how she was in her twenties – too old for marriage, someone remarks – when she was brought from the countryside to serve Salazar, growing up alongside him: him remaining in power is her life’s work.

Filipe Costa constructs a fascinating life-size diorama that incorporates the eerie and quiet banality of evil through the lens of a work like The Zone of Interest [+see also:
film review
trailer
film profile] while also being fixated on the dynamics of a household, such as the one in I'm Still Here [+see also:
film review
trailer
film profile], where unspoken and unacknowledged truths hang low over every movement in the home. Three young domestic workers (played by Vera Barreto, Carolina Amaral and Cleia Almeida) represent the world that continues on outside and those who can’t buy into the fantasy: they dream about buying a long coat, a marker of wealth, and disappearing from the home forever. With no fanfare, Our Father – The Last Days of a Dictator emerges as one of the weightiest films in the festival’s Big Screen Competition, also commenting heavily on the changing global political tides. The movie is dealt out in slow, haunting conversations where discomfort is felt in pregnant pauses and where the façade falters.

Although the visuals by Vasco Viana are more on the conventional drama side of the spectrum, Filipe Costa instead uses sound design by Carlos Abreu to elevate the story out of reality: the ticking of clocks and clucking of chickens seem a little too loud, while eerie, ambient tones cut through tense scenes. Animal metaphors that flood Salazar’s nightmares form the other side of his otherwise realist film: a turkey haunts his dreams while his eyes glow red and sheep gather in flocks like crowds awaiting his demise. These sequences from Salazar's perspective punctuate the film, lending us a glimpse into the dictator’s mind through its final images. Does Salazar understand what has happened, or is he merely buying into it, as those around him desire? Is Maria actually the one in power as he ails? Most crucially: do we dare feel empathy for him?

Our Father – The Last Days of a Dictator is a Portuguese production by Uma Pedra no Sapato, with Portugal Film steering its world sales.