Posto avançado do progresso
An Outpost of Progress
At the end of the nineteenth century, two inexperienced Portuguese colonizers disembark in a remote part of the Congo River in order to coordinate a trading post. As time goes by, they become increasingly demoralized by their inability to profit from the ivory trade. A mutual feeling of distrust and misunderstadings with the locals isolates them.
António Pinto Ribeiro: “Interestingly this is a chamber film, a ‘huis clos’ set in Africa, a continent we always think about in terms of wide open areas, endless jungles, and unknown territorial limits.
Hugo Vieira da Silva: This notion is romanticized, for example, by Conrad in ‘heart of Darkness’, which, despite denouncing colonialism, describes Congo as a sort of mythical, wild, unsound and terrible place. On the other hand, in Conrad’s most ingenious and seminal work ‘An Outpost of Progress’, the jungle is a small stage where the misunderstandings and ambiguities of the colonial relationship are staged in a game of hideand- seek, almost burlesque, where the African characters finally gain subjectivity. I wanted to highlight that theatrical aspect.”
In presence of Hugo Vieira da Silva.
- Nuno Lopes - João de Mattos
- Ivo Alexandre - Sant’Anna
- David Caracol - Makola
- Inês Helena - Senhora Makola
- António Mpinda - Gobila
- José Manuel Mendes - Silva Porto
- Cleonise Malulo - Kimpa Vita
- Hugo Vieira da Silva
- based on an novel by Joseph Conrad
- Fernando Lockett
- Pierre Tucat
- Paulo Mil Homens
- João Dourado Santos
- Tânia Franco
Alfama Films
