Promotional material for Film of Portugal event Photo:Courtesy of Yuren

Films of Portugal, the China National Film Museum's first international film exhibition of 2022, is set to kick off on Friday in Beijing. 

The exhibition will screen six feature films and one documentary at the museum's theaters. Most are art house films that show how real people and culture inspired Portuguese filmmakers to tell their stories on the big screen. 

The Green Years, the classic 1963 black-and-white film directed by renowned Portuguese director Paulo Rocha, will be screened for audiences in China. The film tells the story of 19-year-old Julio, who leaves hometown to make a living in Lisbon. Working as an apprentice shoemaker, he meets and falls in love with Ilda, a young housemaid. The film reflects from a certain aspect the strong influence of French New Wave movement on European films.

The production Listen, a 2020 Portuguese drama film written and directed by Portuguese director Ana Rocha de Sousa, will also screen during the event. The film won the Special Jury Prize in the Horizon section at the 77th Venice International Film Festival. The film focuses on a Portuguese family living in London. Due to a misunderstanding, the three children are taken away from their parents by social services and the parents fight to get them back.

Another new production, the 2022 film Km 224 will also meet audiences in China for the first time. Directed by António-Pedro Vasconcelos, the film discusses commonly faced issues in marriage and parenting. Going through a divorce, Mário and Cláudia are arguing over the custody of their two children. As Cláudia forbids Mário to visit the children and prepares to work abroad, more problems are raised and they have to reassess the situation.

The 2022 exhibition is not the first time that cinema has promoted cultural exchanges between China and Portugal. 

In 2016, the first China-Portugal film exhibition was launched in Beijing. A total of 24 Portuguese films were showcased in cinemas in Beijing and Changsha, Hunan Province, during the event. 

The exhibition presented three units, one dedicated to Portuguese film master Manuel de Oliveira, a classic reviewing unit and a unit introducing new contemporary works. Highlighted works included Golden Bear nominee Letters from War and the pioneering Portuguese avant-garde film The Green Years, which will also screen during the 2022 exhibition. 

During the 2016 event's opening ceremony Zhang Hongsen, deputy head of the State Administration of Press, Publication, Radio, Film and Television (SAPPRFT), noted that the China-Portugal film exhibition was launched as part of a mutual agreement to promote Portuguese films in China and Chinese films in Portugal.

In 2015, a year before the exhibition launched in Beijing, it was first held in Portugal, where 32 Chinese films were screened in two cinemas in Lisbon for a month. 

The 2022 event is set to end on September 11. 

The article is contributed by Li Lingxiao

Promotional material for film Listen Photo:Courtesy of Yuren