Cinema Releases - Tabu
Bearing the same title as F. W. Murnau’s classic Tabu (1931), shot in black and white and taking place at least partly in a distant land, Gomes’ third feature film is divided in two distinctive yet complementary storylines. Whilst the first part, shot in 35mm and in the present time, portrays a society wallowing in nostalgia, the second part, shot in 16mm, goes back in time and plays with history, sound, the concept of linear narration, as well as the ideas of melodrama, slapstick, passion and tragedy. Both parts feature Aurora at two different stages of her life: an older Aurora regrets a past long gone while a younger Aurora dreams of a more passionate life. A virtuoso film, Tabu also offers a reflection on Europe’s colonial past.
WINNER, ALFRED BAUER PRIZE for INNOVATION
WINNER, FIPRESCI INTERNATIONAL CRITICS’ PRIZE
Miguel Gomes was born in Lisbon in 1972. He studied at the Lisbon Film and Theatre School and between 1996 and 2000 worked as a film critic in Portugal. He directed several short films that went on to win awards in Oberhausen, Belfort and Vila do Conde. His films were screened in Locarno, Rotterdam, Buenos Aires and Vienna. The Face You Deserve (2004) was his first feature film. In 2008, he presented Our Beloved Month of August in the Directors' Fortnight. The film was subsequently selected in more than forty international festivals where it won over a dozen prizes. The Viennale (Austria, 2008), Bafici (Argentina, 2009), and the Centro de Artes e Imaxes da Corunha (Spain, 2009) have organized retrospectives of his work.
Tabu is his latest film, which premiered in Berlin in February 2012, won the Alfred Bauer Prize for Innovation as well as the Fipresci International Critics’ Prize.
2012 TABU
2008 AQUELE QUERIDO MÊS DE AGOSTO (OUR BELOVED MONTH OF AUGUST)
2006 CANTICO DE CRIATURAS (CANTICLE OF ALL CREATURES) - short
2004 A CARA QUE MERECES (THE FACE YOU DESERVE)
2002 KALKITOS - short
TRINTA E UM (31 MEANS TROUBLES) - short
2000 INVENTÁRIO DE NATAL (A CHRISTMAS INVENTORY) - short
1999 ENTRETANTO (MEANWHILE) - short
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Director |
Miguel Gomes |
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Script |
Miguel Gomes and Mariana Ricardo |
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Cinematographer |
Rui Poças (AIP) |
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Editors |
Telmo Churro, Miguel Gomes |
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Sound |
Vasco Pimentel |
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1st Assistant Director |
Bruno Lourenço |
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Continuity |
Telmo Churro |
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Artistic Consultant B&W |
Silke Fischer |
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Art Director |
Bruno Duarte |
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Costumes |
Silvia Grabowski |
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Hair & Make-up |
Araceli Fuente and Donna Meirelles |
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Sound Editors |
Miguel Martins and António Lopes |
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Mixing |
Miguel Martins |
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Production manager |
Joaquim Carvalho |
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Producers |
Luís Urbano and Sandro Aguilar |
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Co-producers |
Janine Jackowski, Jonas Dornbach, Maren Ade, |
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Fabiano Gullane, Caio Gullane, Debora Ivanov, Gabriel Lacerda, |
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Thomas Ordonneau |
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Associate producer |
Alexander Bohr, ZDF/ARTE |
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In co-operation with Georg Steinert, ARTE |
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Executive producer |
Luís Urbano |
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A production of |
O Som e a Fúria, Komplizen Film, Gullane, Shellac Sud |
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With the support of |
ICA, IP, ANCINE – Agência Nacional para o Cinema (Brazil) |
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Filmfördering Hamburg Schleswig-Holstein (Germany) |
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With the participation of |
CNC (France) |
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Produced with support of |
Ibermedia |
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Developed with |
the MEDIA Programme of the European Community |
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and participation of |
ZDF/ARTE and RTP |
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PORTUGAL 2012 - BLACK AND WHITE - 35mm -118 MINUTES - DOLBY SR SRD – 1:1.37 - In Portuguese with English subtitles |
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Music: |
Variações pindéricas sobre a insensatez |
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Joana Sá |
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Played by Joana Sá |
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Cosí come viene |
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Vito Pallavicini & Ezio Leoni |
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Performed by Conjunto de Oliveira Muge |
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Tú serás mi baby |
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Phil Spector, Ellie Greenwich & Jeff Barry |
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Performed by Les Surfs |
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Baby I Love You |
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Phil Spector, Ellie Greenwich & Jeff Barry |
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Performed by The Ramones |
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Lonely Wine |
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Roy Wells |
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Performed by Mickey Gilley |
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CAST |
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Pilar |
TERESA MADRUGA |
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Aurora (Old) |
LAURA SOVERAL |
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Aurora (Young) |
ANA MOREIRA |
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Gian Luca Ventura (Old) |
HENRIQUE ESPÍRITO SANTO |
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Gian Luca Ventura (Young) |
CARLOTO COTTA |
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Santa |
ISABEL CARDOSO |
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Aurora's husband |
IVO MÜLLER |
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Mário |
MANUEL MESQUITA |
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Painter |
CÁNDIDO MANUEL |
"Pure magic...it's the absolute quintessence of movie romance"
Tim Robey The Daily Telegraph
★★★★★
"The most joyously odd and surprising film of the year...a delirious celebration of story and the cinematic imagination"
Jonathan Romney The Independent on Sunday
★★★★★
"A new master is born...just breathtaking"
David Jenkins Little White Lies
"The past is Old Hollywood, Phil Spector's wall of sound, colonial escapades and the passions of youth in Miguel Gomes' plaintive and dazzling movie odyssey"
Trevor Johnston Sight & Sound
★★★★★
"Beautifully shot, brilliantly directed and superbly written, this is a hugely rewarding, achingly emotional Portuguese drama that's unlike anything else you'll see this year. Unmissable."
Matthew Turner, VIEW London
"Audacious and intricate... this year’s Berlin selection would have been routine indeed without it."
Nick James, Sight and Sound
"The ravishing black and white cinematography makes Gomes’ film a wonderfully cinematic experience. Tabu is a rare work that manages to draw on the past while creating something that feels very modern indeed."
Gail Tolley, The List
'It’s tough to suppress the hyperbole when discussing Tabu the beguiling new film from Portuguese visionary (see!) Miguel Gomes…
It’s a film which possesses the innate ability to send regular orgasmic shivers down the spine…
A film of blissful, life-affirming ‘moments’…An enchanting, harrowing and hilarious melodrama about memory and cinema…
Tabu’s greatness cannot be properly gauged from a single sitting, though the feeling is that it will only gain depth and richness on second, third and fourth viewings.
David Jenkins, Little White Lies★★★★★
Nothing prepared me for the winking bliss of Tabu, by some distance the most enjoyable and creatively ambitious film I’ve seen here this year...
The film’s a strange, zonked study of contemporary distrust and isolation, and then it’s a swooningly romantic tale of savannah trysts in the Out of Africa/White Mischief mould, …never-forgotten amour fou, the whole story of which is sonorously narrated, in one of recent cinema’s most sublimely-written voiceovers, by the great love of her life.
IN SHORT, IT’S SIMPLY GLORIOUS — GIDDY AND PULSE-QUICKENING
Tim Robey The Daily Telegraph★★★★★
TABU IS A FANTASTIC FILM, EQUALLY AS MOVING AS IT IS ENJOYABLE…this unadulterated, joyful black and white masterstroke...
Patrick Gamble Cinevue
‘Hypnotic voice-overs, non sequitur Phil Spector covers and yet more crocodiles make Tabu a rare pleasure, and an outright hoot in its lugubrious way.’
Jonathan Romney, The Independent on Sunday
'Tabu prompted something approaching a collective swoon at its world premiere...'
Dennis Lim The New York Times
Watch clips of Tabu on vimeo
Watch the press conference in Berlin following the screening of Tabu in competition
Watch an interview with Miguel Gomes conducted in Berlin by Radio Eins
Read an interview with Miguel Gomes on his film The Face You Deserve by Mark Peranson in Film Comment
O Som e a Furia (production company) - more clips etc
Download photo 1 Photo 2 Photo 3 Photo 4 Photo 5
Poster - hi-res jpeg