“An unforgettable day 50 years after the day that shook Portugal and had a strong impact on other dictatorships in Europe at the time. Wait for the documentary: The party was beautiful, man – Memories of April 25th.”
:: ‘We cannot let the river of 25 de Abril lose its bed’, says Marilinda Fernandes ::
Thus, Argentine documentary filmmaker living in Brazil, Carlos Pronzato announced his new film on his social networks. He is in Portugal to record interviews and follow the celebrations of the 50th anniversary of the Carnation Revolution.
“Today, April 25th, a public holiday here in Lisbon, a giant demonstration celebrating the end of a bloodthirsty 48-year dictatorship. Exciting. We recorded countless mini interviews with people and I was able to see up close the famous chaimite, the tank used in the Carnation Revolution on April 25, 1974 and also the Capitães de Abril”.
To the Brazil in fact RSsaid that he felt like he was in the middle of the giant act within the famous painting “Poetry is on the street”, by the Portuguese painter Maria Helena Vieira da Silva (conceived based on the poem with that name by the poet Sophia de Mello Brenner).
“Walking with that crowd along Avenida Liberdade to Rossio shouting every few moments “Fascism never again!” It is a warning for the moment we are living in Portugal and in the world with the rise of the ultra-right”, he warns.
:: Carlos Pronzato, a filmmaker of social struggles in Latin America ::
According to Pronzato, being in Lisbon participating in this celebration, carrying out his work with intervention cinema is fundamental to reviving that spirit of freedom and seeing many of the people who made the Carnation Revolution possible. “As it is written on Portuguese walls, April 25th always!”
Carlos Pronzato had never recorded a documentary in Europe / Personal archive
Despite having already covered several themes from the 1970s in Latin America, Pronzato had never recorded a documentary in Europe.
“This is a baptism of our political cinema on the old continent and the 50th anniversary of the Carnation Revolution marks (using the verb purposefully) the most exciting overthrow of a dictatorship uniting the people and the Armed Forces movement, a very rare combination to see, and that was perhaps the first element that led me to conceive the beginning of research for this new project and now to be here on the ‘battlefield'”, he explains.
Editing: Marcelo Ferreira
