veins of life

Danish anthro­pol­o­gist Chris­t­ian Suhr embarks on a jour­ney through Egypt and into the spir­i­tu­al world of the Sufis. Togeth­er with his Islam­ic friend Muham­mad, he meets numer­ous believ­ers for talks … read more

For nearly 20 years, the self-orga­nized Motor­rodil­lo Asso­cia­cion has pro­vid­ed people in Colom­bia with an afford­able means of local trans­porta­tion. They are cob­bled-togeth­er plat­forms with seats for pas­sen­gers, space for … read more

A man sleeps sound­ly on a col­or­ful sofa. A tele­phone rings. Then he walks through land­scape, some­where in Africa. A vil­lage, a roost­er crows, some­one sleeps under a mos­qui­to tent. … read more

Rivers are the life­lines of the earth - VEINS OF THE AMAZON fills this notion with fervor by look­ing and lis­ten­ing to what the river means to the people living … read more

“Here is a place beyond space and time” says Kalam, who guides view­ers through the world’s largest refugee camp in Bangladesh. His poetic words form the frame­work of the film. … read more

The pass­port of the Sene­galese Mbaye is full of stamps. His family lives in Por­tu­gal, he lives more in the car than at home. Mbaye ensures the couri­er ser­vice between the con­ti­nents. He reg­u­lar­ly drives from Lisbon to Dakar and back, the two places he calls home. That’s 4,000 kilo­me­ters in an old Peu­geot 504 packed to the rafters with goods and orders from family and acquain­tances in the dis­tant dias­po­ra.  

The camera is his co-driver, watch­ing and lis­ten­ing above all. More than with the steer­ing wheel, the driver is busy with his cell phone. There is con­stant radio con­tact, with the family, and his “cus­tomers” announce more wishes and ques­tions. When all the goods and gifts have reached the clien­tele it goes back with a load of African masks. At the end, they lie spread out on a cloth in a Por­tuguese market, as if they embod­ied the count­less voices in the film: “Yes, I’m fine, all good back here, we’ll stay in touch.” Mbaye has ful­filled his mis­sion in the migrant net­work. 

PEDRO FIGUEIREDO born 1984, is a Por­tuguese film­mak­er, anthro­pol­o­gist and archi­tect. His pro­fes­sion­al and cre­ative work focus­es on bor­ders, forced dis­place­ment and social and spa­tial seg­re­ga­tion. He has direct­ed short films such as CURUPIRA (2016), BULWARK (2016), WITHERING REFUGE (2020) or SIZIGIA (2021).  

RICARDO FALCÃO, born in 1980, is a film­mak­er and anthro­pol­o­gist. Since 2007, he has focused his work on Sene­gal, a coun­try where he has con­duct­ed ethno­graph­ic stud­ies for a long time. Ethnog­ra­phy is at the center of his work. His first expe­ri­ence with film was the ethno­graph­ic doc­u­men­tary WALO WALO in 2009.

Direc­tors, Script: Pedro Neto, Ricar­do Falcão
Cin­e­matog­ra­phy: Pedro Neto
Sound: Ricar­do Falcão
Music: Mattia Bonafi­ni, Filipe Palha
Editor: Fran­cis­co Moreira
Pro­duc­er: Joana Fer­reira, Isabel Machado
Dis­tri­b­u­tion: Sopro Filmes