Showing only footage from archival sources made during the 48 years of Portuguese dictatorship (news reels, war reportage, propaganda documentaries, photographs of political prisoners, along with rushes not included in final cuts), “Nature Morte / Visages d’une Dictature” invites audiences to rediscover these archives, indeed to delve into them, thereby proposing different interpretations. By “revisiting” episodes that occurred during the dictatorship, the film attempts to make the recent past become part of the present, and through it, to confront viewers with one of many possible stories of a dictatorial regime.
Using only archival footage made during the forty-eight years of the Portuguese dictatorship, this documentary attempts to make the recent past become part of the present, to make the experience tangible for viewers and to confront them, evoking one of many possible stories of a dictatorial regime, thereby redeeming, several years after the events took place, the emotions and anger of the time. This violent period put an end to a joyful, peaceful revolution. “[This film] takes a poetic, off-beat look at a significant period of Portuguese history: the dictatorship that lasted from 1926 to 1974. The director uses archival material, in slow motion, brings the faces of political prisoners to the forefront, along with all of those who supported the Salazar regime. A striking documentary.” – L’Humanité
