Vanessa Rodrigues, a documentary filmmaker and university professor in Portugal, hit the roads of Mozambique in July to collect testimonies and give voice to silences through a documentary of critical reflection on the history of the two countries.
“It arises from a cultural heritage, the heritage of Portuguese soldiers who went to countries like Angola, Mozambique, Guinea-Bissau, to make a war, in which many of them did not believe. And I inherited, to some extent, this story from my uncle and godfather Joaquim Sequeira Ferreira, who was stationed in Cabo Delgado [northern Mozambique] between 1970 and 1972 “, begins by explaining to Lusa, in Maputo, Vanessa Ribeiro Rodrigues, director of the documentary” Feitiço de Areia “.
The film began to be shot on July 11, by a Portuguese-Mozambican team, with funding from the Institute of Cinema and Audiovisual and the support of Camões – Institute for Cooperation and Language, having passed, in thousands of kilometers by land, water and sea, through Nampula, Ilha de Moçambique and Pemba, until arriving in Maputo, in the collection of intergenerational testimonies on the knowledge of the struggle for liberation, the colonial war and contemporary activisms.
“As I listen to these war stories, I realize what it means to have been a Portuguese soldier deployed in Cabo Delgado. These memories take the form of a critical reflection that I realize I did not do at school (…) of what war crimes meant, what a country that oppresses another meant, what it meant, for example, soldiers aged 19, 20 who are deployed to go to a so-called war “, he points out.
In this understanding, the aerograms, photographs and slides from that period “take the form of a kind of single narrative that is hegemonic”, which, he argues, “still exists in Portugal”, through silence.
“From my perspective, we need to find out what these silences are. Why? Because when I sat my uncle down the first time to tell the story, everything he told me in the form of some revolt – some anguish for a past in which he did not believe, he was wounded, he is alive, he survived, he might not have survived like many Portuguese soldiers – I realize that when the camera turns on, he does not tell the story. There are silences”, he recalls.
“So I come looking for these silences in Mozambique. These other narratives, these other voices that the history of my country does not tell me. These voices are intergenerational, they are everyday voices, they are voices of young people, they are voices of ex-combatants, they are voices of people who were also part of a war, but for the sovereignty of their country, for the struggle for liberation “, he adds.
So in Mozambique, on the ground, the task was just one: “I came to listen”.
“I didn’t come with any pre-defined agenda of who would be interviewed. They came up along the way, as we arrived (…) and we don’t know each other. The first time we speak is when the camera turns on. That is a difference. The camera is used as a device, it is that person talking to Vanessa, looking at the camera”, the author emphasizes, about the 23 interviewees “with stories to tell”.
Without revealing the final result, he describes that they are “stories of silences, of assimilated people, of people who were forced to sing the Portuguese anthem at school being Mozambicans”, or even of those who are still “afraid to speak”.
“It also happened, for example, in Pemba, that we agreed with a lady who then, when it came time to record, preferred not to record because she was afraid. Even because she said that the dream of the revolution is yet to be fulfilled, they promised us a lot and we are yet to fulfill that dream”, she observes.
They are, therefore, also stories of young people about the social problems of the country and the new activisms in Mozambique, through a “joint reflection”, with “plural voices”.
“The documentary is just the beginning, it’s this idea of the spell that is a narrative. ‘Feitiço de Areia’ is born from the idea of a metaphor. The spell is that we are all bewitched and bewitched by a narrative that is the only one, that is hegemonic. How do we undo this spell? By listening to other voices, by listening to other sides of the story. And sand because it is sediment, it is traces of the past, at the same time it is the unknown. So we go looking for that unknown,” he admits.
In essence, a critical reflection on history, “to look at the present and the future in this common dialogue”.
“The idea is that this movie doesn’t stop there. People who want to participate can send us an email, for example. We send the questions and if they want to participate, even anonymously, about this common dialogue between the history of Mozambique and Portugal, and what silences are these, they can send us the audio. The idea is to also create a website so that these stories can be housed for the future”, he explains.
With recordings and interviews in emblematic places, such as the Island of Mozambique or the Museum of the Revolution, among others, the documentary addresses topics such as slavery and colonialism, always from the perspective of a side of history still marked by silence.
The documentary has the support of Golpe Filmes, Sony Portugal and ColorFoto and is scheduled to premiere in Mozambique in 2024, when the 50th anniversary of April 25 in Portugal is marked, which precedes the independence of the former colonies in Africa.
“It has a universal message. Many European countries have also started to apologize for their actions, for the mistakes of the past. And there is also this interest in 50 years later, half a century of independence, the struggles for independence”, explains Vanessa, who leads the Portuguese-Mozambican team with five other members.
“I hope that the film can make this essay of reflection on Mozambique and Portugal (…) a trigger to trigger this conversation, in this dialog that I also intend to do for the future”, he concludes.
