Spell Reel
A collective film assembled by Filipa César
In 2011, an archive of film and audio material re-emerged in Bissau. On the verge of complete ruination, the footage testifies to the birth of Guinean cinema as part of the decolonising vision of Amílcar Cabral, the liberation leader assassinated in 1973. In collaboration with the Guinean filmmakers Sana na N’Hada and Flora Gomes, and many allies, Filipa César imagines a journey where the fragile matter from the past operates as a visionary prism of shrapnel to look through. Digitised in Berlin, screened and live commented, the archive convokes debates, storytelling, and forecasts. From isolated villages in Guinea-Bissau to European capitals, the silent reels are now the place from where people search for antidotes for a world in crisis.
S P E L L R E E L - Julio Djaló (teaser) from Filipa César on Vimeo.
Projections
Palmarès
FESTIVALS
11/18 : Museo Nazionale del Cinema - Fondazione Maria Adriana Prolo, Tribute to Contemporary Portuguese Cinema, Torino, Italy
11/18 : Bienal de la Imagen en Movimiento, Buenos Aires, Argentina
11/18 : Beast International Film Festival, Portuguese Abroad special screening, Bucharest
11/18 : Cample Line, Scotland, UK
11/18 : Mostra África(s), Rio de Janeiro, Brazil
11/18 : Document Film Festival, Scottish Youth Theatre, Glasgow
10/18 : Les Rendez-vous de l'histoire 2018, Blois, France
09/18 : Beast IFF, Porto, Portugal
07/18 : Durban International Film Festival"
07/18 : Asia Culture Center, Korea
07/18 : China and Portuguese Languages Countries Film Festival 2018
06/18 : "Porto/Post/Doc - Film & Media Festival (Portugal)"
06/18 : Whitstable Biennale
05/18 : VideoEX, Zurich, Suisse
05/18 : Taiwan International Documentary Film, Taiwan
05/18 : Jeonju International Film Festival, South Korea
04/18 : Images Festival, Toronto, Canada
03/18 : Cinéma du Réel, Paris
02/18 : Cartagena International Film Festival-FICCI, Colombia
02/18 : Portland International Film Festival, US
12/17 : Transcinema Lima, Peru
11/17 : Kaunas IFF, Lithuania
11/17 : Porto Post-doc, Portugal
11/17 : Rencontres Internationales du Documentaire de Montréal - RIDM, Canada
11/17 : Torino Film Festival, compétition internationale
10/17 : BFI London Film Festival
10/17 : Doclisboa, compétition nationale, Portugal
10/17 : Festival CineMigrante, Barcelona (Spain)
10/17 : OUFF, Ourense (Spain)
09/17 : Festival CineMigrante, Buenos Aires (Argentina)
09/17 : Festival International de San Sebastian, Spain
09/17 : Indie Festival, Brazil
04/17 : BAFICI, Buenos Aires, Argentina
03/17 : iREP, Lagos (Archiving Africa)
02/17 : Berlinale / Forum, Germany (world premiere)
AWARDS
04/18 : TD Bank Group Award, Images Festival, Toronto, Canada
10/17 : Special Mention of the international competition jury and José Saramago price Doclisboa, compétition nationale, Portugal
09/17 : Special Mention / Festival International de San Sebastian, Spain
PROJECTIONS / SCREENINGS / SEMINARS
06/2018 - Home, Manchester, UK
06/2018 - Whitstable Biennale, Canterbury, UK
05/2018 - Daumenkino, Braunschweig, Germany
05/2018 - Cine Dore, Madrid, Spain
02/2018 - “Decolonizing Decolonization” at the 18, Marrakech, Morocco
02/2018 - Eye Filmmuseum - Amsterdam, Netherlands
10/2017 - Karlsruhe (Kinemathek)
06/2017 - Moma, New York, USA
06/2017 - Art Basel, Switzerland
VOD
10/2018 - Tënk
10/2017 – MUBI
THEATRICAL RELEASES
04/18 : Germany
06/18 : Portugal
COLLECTIONS
Image de la Culture / CNC / France
Filipa César is an artist and filmmaker interested in the porous boundaries between the moving image and its reception, the fictional dimensions of the documentary and the economies, politics and poetics inherent to cinema praxis. Great part of César's experimental films have been focussed on the spectres of resistance in Portugal’s geo-political past, questioning mechanisms of history production and proposing spaces for performing subjective knowledge. Since 2011, César has been researching the origins of cinema in Guinea-Bissau, its imaginaries and potencies, developing that research into the collective project Luta ca caba inda (the struggle is not over yet). She was a participant of the research projects Living Archive (2011-13) and Visionary Archive (2013-15) both organised by the Arsenal - Institute for Film and Video Art, Berlin.
César premiered her first feature-length essay-film Spell Reel (2017) at the Forum section of the 67. Berlinale, 2017. Selected exhibitions and screenings have taken place at: 29th São Paulo Biennial, 2010; Manifesta 8, Cartagena, 2010; Haus der Kulturen der Welt, Berlin, 2011–15; Jeu de Paume, Paris, 2012; Khiasma, Paris, 2011–2015; Kunstwerke, Berlin, 2013; SAAVY Contemporary, Berlin 2014–15; Tensta konsthall, Spånga, 2015; Mumok, Vienna, 2016; Contour 8 Biennial, Mechelen and Gasworks, London; MoMA, New York, 2017.
Selected Film Festivals include :
Kurzfilmtage Oberhausen, 2013; Curtas Vila do Conde, 2012-2015; Forum Expanded - Berlinale, 2013 and 2016; IFFR, Rotterdam, 2010, 2013 and 2015; Indie Lisboa, 2010; DocLisboa,2011.
Filmography
F for Fake (2005)
Rapport (2007)
Le Passeur (2008)
The Four Chambered Heart (2009)
Memograma (2010)
The Embassy (2011)
Cacheu (2012)
Conakry (2013)
Sol Miné (2014)
Transmission from the Liberated Zones (2016)
Spell Reel (2017)
Sunstone (2018)
See also
IMDB
UniFrance
Vimeo
"Luta ca caba inda" Salle du Jeu de Paume
"Luta ca caba inda" à Arsenal
Entretien "Luta ca caba inda" [La lutte n'est pas finie] au Jeu de Paume
Entretien Louis Henderson and Filipa Cesar: Op-Film an Archaeology of Optics**