Catarina Mourão

Astrakan 79

1979. Flicking through pictures from a Soviet magazine, 15-year-old Martim dreams of building a new society. His radical communist parents send him to study at Astrakan for one year. In her new film, Catarina Mourão captures with tremendous precision the moment a middle-aged man passes his story on to his son, thus shedding the taboo of his ineffable experience.

The Wolf's Lair

Every family has its secrets, the family of Portuguese filmmaker Mourão included. As the granddaughter of the well-known writer Tomaz de Figueiredo, she picks apart several of them in an intimate yet universally meaningful way. As such, her film also becomes a portrait of dictatorship and resistance and of the urge to create art.