26/04/2005

The 37th Director's FortNight of the Cannes Film Festival will include two new Portuguese productions: Odete [+see also:
trailer
film profile] the second feature film by João Pedro Rodrigues and Alice [+see also:
film review
trailer
interview: Marco Martins
interview: Nuno Lopes
film profile], the directorial début of Marco Martins. Monteiro is dead. Oliveira is absent. Forget the old monsters; Rodrigues and Martins took their place. This year, Cannes belongs to them.

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João Pedro Rodrigues, whose first opus was Parabéns in 1997, is back to an international film festival after his acclaimed first feature film O Fantasma, that opened in the Venice Film Festival in the year 2000. After two films strongly based on male characters, performed by non professional actors, the 38 year old filmmaker chose a woman as the main character of his second film. Hollywood star wannabe Ana Cristina Oliveira (who was in the cast of Tim Story's American remake of French blockbuster Taxi) stars in a story about a love triangle in which one of the parts involved is already dead. Odete was produced by Rosa Rosafilmes.

The Director's FortNight will also show Alice by Marco Martins. Starring Nuno Lopes and Beatriz Batarda (The Murmuring Coast), Martins'first film a story about loss and grieve. The 32 year old director, who is also a publicist, previously worked in the production of films by Wim Wenders, Manoel de Oliveira (The Fifth Empire) and Bertrand Tavernier. Alice was produced by Clap Filmes, with the support of the Ministry of Culture, the ICAM, and public broadcaster RTP.