A metamorfose dos pássaros

Beatriz and Henrique meet, fall in love and get married when Beatriz is 21 years old. Henrique is a naval officer and goes to sea. Beatriz looks after their six children at home. One day she dies unexpectedly. Her oldest son is Jacinto. Since early childhood, he has dreamed of turning into a bird. Jacinto is the father of director Catarina Vasconcelos, whose mother also died when Catarina was 17. After the loss of their mothers Catarina started to work on a film called A metamorfose dos pássaros.
With borrowings from Manoel de Oliveira and Agnès Varda, Catarina Vasconcelos has brought her family history to life in this intimate, very personal film that is rather like a polyphonic diary. Remembrance and mourning merge into a poetic narrative in which father and daughter talk about their history and the film that is emerging from it. Like the two deceased mothers, the film’s images offer protection against the relentless passage of time. And as the living protagonists whose voices we hear come to realise, parting is a prerequisite for a new beginning.