Yesterday, the Restos do Vento team of Thiago Guedes took to the red carpet.

During the presentation of the film crew on stage at the Sala Buñuel, Thierry Frenot, head of programming for the official Cannes section, made a good point, but as if he were not one of the main culprits of this fact: already sixteen. years since a Portuguese film, mostly Portuguese and with a Portuguese director, was not selected.

The last person to receive this honor was Pedro Costa, a contender for the Palme d’Or in 2006, “Juventude em Marcha”. special sessions of the festival. Which, in any case, was directed by the director, producer Paulo Branco, screenwriter Thiago Rodriguez, by the way, the new director of the prestigious Avignon Theater Festival, and the main characters of the film, such as Nuno Lopez, Albano Geronimo or Isabelle Abreu, just before entering the legendary red carpet in Cannes.

“Restos do Vento” was a project that Thiago Guedes carried out for about ten years, and the lack of funding prompted the author in the meantime to create “A Herdade”, “Tristeza e Alegria na Vida das Girafas” and several television programs. row. The film, a tragedy rooted deep in a small community in the hinterland, begins with a trauma inflicted on one of her young men by the pagan and ancestral tradition of the Caretos. Twenty-five years later, the reunion of several characters with their past and the commission of a crime brings buried secrets and unredeemed guilt to the surface.

At the same time as it wraps up a drama that highlights a lot of what we are as Portuguese, Restos do Vento lives on from the director’s solid and reliable storytelling, the amazing photography of Mark Bliss, and the remarkable work of some elite Portuguese actors. and actresses, offering us a film that certainly deserves participation in the competition and is already scheduled for September 22.

However, the competition continued: new films by two Palme d’Or winners, Swede Robert Östlund (Square, 2017) and Romanian Cristian Mungiu (4 months, 3 weeks and 2 days), were screened. ., in 2007). The Swede’s new film Triangle of Sorrow also follows the Swede’s ironic and caustic take on life and art, which won him the top prize at Cannes. Built in three acts, the film begins with a selection of male models, then embarks on a journey on a luxury yacht, and ends on an apparently uninhabited island where some of the survivors of the shipwreck will reside.

Those who enjoyed O Quadrado, a non-consensual film that stirred passions while leaving others indifferent, will surely remember the already iconic dinner scene. Now, in this new film, dinner is on the high seas, and eschatology invades the dramatic space of the film, making it accessible only to stomachs accustomed to such creative freedom. However, it is unlikely that Östlund will take another spot on the final list.

On the contrary, this can happen with the Romanian “RMN”, where the center of Mungiu is in a small village in the mountains of Transylvania, and the economy is centered on a bakery, with two women managing the property and management. But due to the fact that men have to emigrate to Germany and other countries in the region, there is not enough skilled labor, and the factory is forced to take workers from Sri Lanka in order to continue working.

But the community, very closed in on itself, even after the expulsion of the gypsy rebel community, ceases to buy bread where it has always been, and does not give up until the foreign workers are expelled. Mungiu ruthlessly condemns xenophobia, describing in beautiful, humanistic strokes the life of some of the inhabitants of the area.

A pagan tradition in a village in the interior of Portugal leaves painful marks on a group of young teenagers. 25 years later, when they meet again, the past comes up and tragedy begins.