João Braz

The Survivors (2025)

Mid-19th century. A group of survivors from a wrecked slave ship, both black and white, end up on a deserted island, somewhere in the Atlantic Ocean. The fight for survival and power will flip the moral and social values of those days. ...

Cândido (2024)

A national coach working in Lisbon during World War II also acted as a spy for the Allies, leading a risky double life ...

Hands in the Fire (2024)

The young film student Maria do Mar is working on a documentary about the old manor houses along the Douro River. It is the final project in her thesis on "Reality in Cinema". Maria has an unlimited confidence in what is visible. Her candour and her naivet ...

We Are on Air (2024)

Thirty-something Vítor still lives with his mother, Fátima, in his grandmother Júlia's apartment. Fátima is a hairdresser with a quiet disposition who, at night, fantasises about the policeman who has just moved in next door. By day, Vítor is a lowly ...

Living Bad (2023)

A hotel by the northern shore of Portugal welcomes its guests over the weekend. A man is torn between being present for his wife and the space that his mother takes up between the two of them. A mother encourages her daughter's marriage to enable her own l ...

Bad Living (2023)

In a family-run hotel, by the Portuguese northern shore, lives a group of women from different generations of the same family, whose relationships with each other have grown poisoned by bitterness. They try to survive in the declining hotel, as the unexpec ...

Sombras Brancas (2023)

At the age of 71, a highly regarded writer, José Cardoso Pires, suffers a major stroke and loses his memory and the ability to relate to the rest of the world. Everybody seems to defy the famous author to write another novel that recounts this adventure t ...

Wolf and Dog (2022)

Ana was born in São Miguel, an island in the middle of the Atlantic Ocean ruled by religion and traditions. Growing up as the middle child of a family of three with her mother and grandmother. Early Ana realized that girls and boys were given different ta ...

Nothing Ever Happened (2022)

António is a farmer who leaves his land to go to the city where his son Jorge lives. However, unlike a perfect portrait, the patriarch finds a life of lies, a broken marriage and Pedro, a grandson with dangerous attitudes. It all translates into a life of ...

Um Filme em Forma de Assim (2022)

Organized like a dream, structured like a musical and with texts, both spoken and sung, that lead us to unexpected, chaotic and exciting situations, which try to grasp part of what the unattainable Alexandre O'Neill left us. ...

A Pleasure, Comrades! (2021)

1975, the year after the Carnation Revolution. Eduarda, João and Mick come from Northern Europe to work in the co-ops in the occupied farms of central Portugal. Like many others, they come to help with the land and the livestock, give medical appointments ...

Amor Fati (2021)

Amor Fati seeks out parts that complete each other. These are portraits of couples, friends, families and pets and their owners. They share the intimacy of daily life, habits, beliefs, tastes and even some physical traits. From their faces, from the choreo ...

The Year of the Death of Ricardo Reis (2020)

Fernando Pessoa, one of the greatest writers in Portuguese, created an immense parallel world and several heteronyms so as to endure the loneliness of genius. José Saramago, 1998 Nobel Laureate in Literature, has a heteronym, Ricardo Reis, return to Portu ...

Fojos (2020)

Castro Laboreiro, in the far north of Portugal, is a place whose hills lead to a dead-end street. They call it the end-of-the-world's pit. Men and wolves live abreast. Wolves leave their lair to freely attack the preys of men locked in their burrows. Both ...

Reynard (2019)

Cunning and slender, harassed and on the run, Reynard is a metaphor of a never ending obsession with each breath, each gesture, each thought. Marta seeks in the emptiness of her body a way to arrive to her inner essence, in an abstract search of a free spi ...

Quero-te Tanto! (2019)

A romance comedy about a nonconformist couple of young parents who, looking for a solution to their fragile financial situation, is involved in an innocent and crazy scheme. ...

Jazzé Duarte (2019)

A Documentary by Jorge Paixão da Costa that honors José Duarte and his radio program "five minutes of Jazz" ...

Ashore (2018)

Ashore portrays the life of a singular fisherman in an ancient riverfront community near Lisbon. Divided between the quiet solitude of the river and the family ties that wash him ashore, the film follows Albertino Lobo, as nature renews itself with each se ...

Sea (2018)

Francisca, a beautiful 50-year-old widow, prepared a peaceful future for herself. In an unexpected outburst, she grabs an opportunity for change and embarks on a sailboat called 'Hovering Over the Water'. ...

3 Anos Depois (2018)

A woman returns. Now that the night has fallen, a storm approaches. ...

Soldier Millions (2018)

A Portuguese soldier, who got stranded from his team during the La Lys battle, struggles by himself through dozens of German offensives so he can guarantee the safety of his companions. ...

Apparition (2018)

A writer becomes the main character in the story he intended to write ...

Diary of Beiras (2017)

A journey through the Beiras region. The houses, the cafes, the streets, the people still living in them. What the lands were and are, and the testimonies of those still living there. The day-by-day of some of those people – less and less, and increasing ...

Fátima (2017)

The journey of 11 women while they go on a pilgrimage from Bragança to Fatima. ...

The Day of My Wedding (2016)

The film follows the adventures of a bride and her family on the verge of a nervous breakdown on her wedding day. ...

Ama-San (2016)

A dive, the midday sunlight filtering down through the water. The air in her lungs has to last until she can dislodge the abalone. Dives like these have been carried out in Japan for over 2000 years by the Ama-San. ...

Gypsophila (2015)

A woman decides to film her visits to her grandmother. In the quiet home, the camera captures the unique relation between these two women 50 years apart. With days passing by, the lines between film and life increasingly become blurred. ...

O Som da Prata (2015)

Yvone Kane (2015)

After her daughter's death, Rita returns to the African country of her childhood to investigate the death of Yvone Kane, a former political activist and guerrilla fighter. There, she becomes embroiled in a journey into the past of a land haunted by war and ...

A Arte da Luz Tem 20.000 Anos (2014)

Documentary about Vale do Côa. ...

The Maias: Story of a Portuguese Family (2014)

The tragedy and comedy in Carlos' life begins, grows and ends like the tragedy and comedy of Portugal. In the company of his close friend, João da Ega, allegedly a brilliant writer, Carlos, with his idle existence as an aristocratic doctor, spends his tim ...

That's Love (2013)

In Caxinas, a fishing neighborhood in Vila do Conde, a city on the north of Portugal, the relationship between the fishermen and their wives is based on vital trust and reciprocal and absolute dependence, in order to assure their families survival. ...

Immaculate (2013)

A man lives isolated in his grandmother's country-house in an attempt to recover from a tragic event involving his family. His lonely and silent days are spent with an unnameable hope. ...

La Valse (2012)

A choreographic poem by Maurice Ravel. ...

A Teia de Gelo (2012)

The story of Jorge, an ambitious hacker with few scruples, which is discovered to divert money from the company where he works and decides to flee. In flight, turns out to have an accident during a snowstorm and, despite being in despair, eventually findin ...

Raul Brandão was a Great Writer... (2012)

This film is an attempt to disclose if Raul Brandão has left any trace, in Nespereira, Gumarães. ...

Florbela (2012)

Shaken by a divorce in the 1920s, Portuguese poetess Florbela Espanca uses her writing to deal with her tumultuous relationship with men, eroticism and love. ...

Anquanto La Lhéngua Fur Cantada (2012)

A documentary about the singings of a Portuguese Village that has their own dialect ...

O Fantasma do Novais (2012)

Blood of My Blood (2011)

A regular family living in the outskirts of Lisbon sees the serenity of their lives shaken beyond any remedy within a week. ...

Zoo (2011)

A six-year-old girl once more silently witnesses a family break up. Her father comes back with an invitation for a day out. ...

The Actor's Work (2011)

Throughout a year's work, a group of ten actors and a film director will work together on the creation of the characters and on the structure of the plot of a new film to come. Long sessions of discussion, rehearsals and endless repetitions serve to develo ...

Nenhum Nome (2011)

After having suffered a serious car accident in which his 6 month pregnant wife is killed, X, a 35 year old man, is admitted in an intensive care unit. K, a 30 year old nurse, will help X during his rehabilitation. K is also 6 months pregnant. This curious ...

Under My Skin (2011)

On a day like any other, a woman leaves work and heads to a party in the outskirts of Lisbon. On her way there she sees a man ready to jump off a bridge. She stops the car and approaches the man, trying to save him. ...

The Social Division of Labor According to Adam Smith (2011)

Five workers on an assembly line at a large company based in an airport challenge the impossibility of changing the social division of labor, carried out in accordance with the classical principles of specialization and segmentation. ...

Disquiet (2010)

Lisbon, today. In a room of a house at Douradores Street, a man invents dreams and theorizes about them. The essence of the dreams itself becomes physical, palpable, visible. The text itself materializes in its musicality. And, in front of our eyes, this m ...

Perdida Mente (2010)

The story of a man who sees his life change radically upon confronting his progressive loss of memory. As his neurological condition advances, it affects not only his own life but the lives of all those who surround him. ...

Oh Lisboa, Meu Lar (2010)

A journey inside the tram crossing the city of Lisbon while listening to fragments of Fernando Pessoa's poetry. ...

Lusitanian Illusion (2010)

Images and sounds expose the duality of Portugal during the days of WW2: a peaceful, god-loving, rural country, providing an escape route for over one hundred thousand European refugees to the Americas; and a political and cultural elite that disguised the ...

How to Draw a Perfect Circle (2009)

Guilherme and Sofia, brother and sister, grow up sharing experiences and slowly discovering their sexuality. The thing that Sofia doesn't know is how far Guilherme will go to keep her inside his own perverse, dark and perfect circle. ...

Para Que Este Mundo Não Acabe! (2009)

"Come and see this world end!" - wrote the the priest António Fontes, father of folk medicine and "burning witches" in Vilar de Perdizes, a desperate plea in his precious monograph of the Barroso region. And I (João Botelho) went. Then I saw the people a ...

Muitos Dias Tem o Mês (2009)

A view of rising dependence to credits in the shadow of a overgrowing economical crisis in a consumers society. ...

Contrato (2009)

Peter McShade is a hitman. A job goes wrong when he kills the nephew of a Mafia Boss in Morocco. ...

True and Tender is the North (2008)

Adaptation of a 1987 novel by Agustina Bessa Luis, a multi-generation exploration of a wealthy family with a mysterious past and a house on the island of Madeira. ...

Corruption (2007)

A crime drama based on the life of a woman who lived for years with a man that was the head of a corruption network in the Portuguese football world. ...

Misbegotten (2007)

Lúcia is misbegotten, unloved and the eternal widow of her own father. A cry of rage in bodily form, she is mad, maltreated and humbled. She wears mourning in remembrance of her mothers crime and betrayal, and gives vent to her inconsolable pain to make s ...

The Mystery of Sintra (2007)

Summer of 1870. Two writers, Eça de Queiroz and Ramalho Ortigão, decide to write a four-handed whodunit for the daily "Diário de Notícias". Could it be that the story they wrote as fiction is based on a real case? This question fuels the conflict betwe ...

Mãe Há Só Uma (2006)

A moment in the life of a grievieng mother with the identity crisis of her teenage daughter. The mother insists on wanting to understand what she only should accept, the daughter can not explain what should be accepted. ...

Flesh of My Flesh (2006)

A woman alone with her secret until one day she can not hold it any longer. ...

Lavado em Lágrimas (2006)

João is a freelance television journalist. When he begins a new story about an old pigeon breeder in a poor neighborhood on the outskirts of Lisbon, João meets Ana, his teenage granddaughter, a mysterious character who is beginning to exercise an irresis ...

The Crime of Father Amaro (2005)

A young priest commits a crime when he falls in love with a beautiful and troubled woman. Based on O Crime do Padre Amaro ("The Crime of Father Amaro"), a novel by the 19th-century Portuguese writer José Maria de Eça de Queiroz. It was first published in ...

Alice (2005)

In the wake of his daughter's disappearance, a father wallowing in grief feeds his desire to find her with unusual methods. ...

Kiss Me (2004)

This movie bring us a story about a woman named Laura (Marisa Cruz) that lives in a small portuguese town during the 50's. Tired of living in such a small town she travells to a bigger town, in which she'll have the opportunity to feel free. ...

In the Darkness of the Night (2004)

A disturbing film about the Portuguese underworld of prostitution. ...

Maria e as Outras (2004)

Maria, an executive from Oporto, lives in the search of the right man for her. On the other hand, her two friends, Joana, a doctor that has fallen in love to a co-worker, and Isilda, a hairdresser with an open hart and an adventurous spirit, seem to be hap ...

Wounded (2003)

Nourished by grief, silence drains the life of a couple who have lost their child. The mother refuses to speak, transforming their home into a place of mourning where memories poison her relationship with her husband. ...

8 8 (2001)

A 14-year-old kid, addicted to videogames, goes with his parents to a shopping mall and separates from them to go to a game store called UTOPYA. He doesn't come back. His parents get in despair, and his father tries everything he can to bring him back. ...

A Man is not a Cat (2001)

A woman gets into a fight with her boyfriend, concerning her lack of humanism. Leaving him abruptly at the Santa Apolónia Station, she strikes a conversation with an interesting homeless man whom she decides to take home to just to show her boyfriend that ...

Anjo Caído (2001)

A boy lives with his mother and younger sister. One day, his mother disappears with her lover, leaving the two children alone. António, the older brother, takes care of his sister, Maria da Luz. The little girl is about 10 months old. When she starts walk ...

Get a Life (2001)

During one winter night, a Portuguese teenager, Alvaro, loses his life in a fight between a youth gang and the cops in a suburb of Paris. Cidalia, a 36 year old cleaning woman, his mother, decides to defy the code of silence of the Portuguese community and ...

Mais Tarde (2001)

During the investigation of a case, Teresa Rubens, a judge with a long career, married and mother of children, finds in court, as a defense witness, a former lover of her student days, Sousa Afonso, who owns some lands in Alentejo. ...

Querida Mãe (2001)

The elder matriarch of a dysfunctional family is mistankenly declared dead. ...

Cavaleiros De Água Doce (2001)

After the passing of one of his friends, João remember's the summer he had with his friends when he was 12 years old. ...

Amor Perdido (2000)

A story about two people (Clara and Tó), from different economic backgrounds, who love each other, but whose love is not accepted by everyone, especially by the father of Clara, who will do everything he can to stop their love. Things go even worse when C ...

A Noiva (2000)

A portuguese officer, supposedly dead in a mine explosion, is captured by the african guerrilla in Guiné (former portuguese colony) while his beloved wife Laura remain inconsolable in Portugal trying to believe that Jorge is still alive. Meanwhile an old ...

Mustang (2000)

Two sons dream of the return of their father who left fifteen years earlier, and all this time without any sign of life... ...

Tarde Demais (2000)

A touching and tragic real life story about a group of Portuguese fishermen who get caught in the middle of a storm in the Tejo river (Lisbon) and struggle to survive. ...

Facas e Anjos (2000)

In 1983, little João Amaral Severo asks his father to go to the circus. His father, and army captain who had been recently widowed, refuses to take him under the pretext that the circus would draw his attention away from his studies. Ten years later João ...

Guardian Angel (1998)

Lúcia is an independent woman who lives alone in Lisbon. Her father commits suicide leaving her a message on phone recorder, revealing a letter he wrote. However Lúcia can't find it in her father's house. On that visit she ends up meeting with her mother ...

Land of Storms (1997)

Lena disappears mysteriously during the winter of 1976. This is the last stop on a journey that begins in colonial Mozambique on new year's eve at 1957 gives way to 1958. Ningo, a black boy brought up by Lena's parents, and her childhood friend, comes to L ...

Porto Santo (1997)

A technical problem aboard a transatlantic flight forces a plane to land in Porto Santo, the small island of Madeira's archipelago where, according to a legend, Christopher Columbus the 15th century navigator, lived for a while and entertained a sexual rel ...

Inês de Portugal (1997)

The consuming passion between Pedro I of Portugal and Ines de Castro is brutally interrupted when Ines is executed, as a consequence of political intrigue and in the name of the kingdom's interests. Pedro, cruelly hurt, pursues the single-minded purpose of ...

Mergulho no Ano Novo (1993)

The Day of My Wedding (2016)

The film follows the adventures of a bride and her family on the verge of a nervous breakdown on her wedding day. ...