Author Susana Bessa

First feral, then domestic, at last foreign. – Raquel Nobre Guerra Growing up happens over time and never stops. At least, that’s what most of us want to believe. It’s a curious thing to think of film fes...

The river as a mode of expression and perception has long been a source of inspiration for many filmmakers. From Jean Renoir to Ritwik Ghatak, Christian Petzold to Jia Zhangke, going upstream has meant giving a...

It is mesmerizing to watch someone so absorbed in their work. (…) Her hands seem almost transparent as she touches the letters, moves them across the screen. All that evidence, turning realer and more dreamli...

Matt and Mara (2024) was my first and last screening at this year’s Berlinale. I can’t remember the last time I saw the same film twice at a film festival. Very little could have prepared me for the beautifully...

Leonor Teles’s mirror-surfaced, headily constructed Baan opens at a moment of contemplation. Against the backdrop of a lilac-infused blue cityscape of the King Power MahaNakhon, the legendary Bangkok skyscraper...

Skimming through my many scribbles in a desired attempt to describe what Curtas Vila do Conde means 30 years into its instalment in Portugal’s now ever-growing film festival scene, the word I found I wrote down...