Introducing: Marina
20 December 2020
After studying together at university, filmmakers Laís Santos Araújo and Pethrus Tibúrcio have known and collaborated with each other for over a decade. The short Como ficamos da mesma altura, directed by Santos Araújo with Tibúrcio as executive producer and assistant director, premiered at IFFR in 2020 in the Voices Short section.
“We loved it!” says Araújo about her experience at IFFR’s last edition. “We went together to Rotterdam and got to know the festival in person. I see it as a place where new auteurs and independent voices from different parts of the world get to be shown alongside films from established directors. It’s a great mix.”
A few months prior to their debut at the festival, Marina was selected for a Script and Project Development grant by the Hubert Bals Fund. “With both these things going on, we had an amazing experience at the festival”, says Tibúrcio, “we got to know filmmakers, producers and film projects from all over the world. I think IFFR is a great opportunity for filmmakers who are creating their work with less conventional and experimental languages.”
Marina is the coming-of-age love story of an adolescent girl who grows up in a violent but beautiful tropical town in Northeast Brazil, an experience very familiar to that of the directors. Laís grew up in the city of Maceió, the setting for Marina, and feels an urgency to write this story, as she explains:
“Despite its beauty, the town has a deep-rooted history of social issues. One of them is the high rate of killings of people from the outskirts of town, especially young, black men, which tend to be overlooked or seen as irrelevant in public opinion. I observed and experienced first-hand what it was like to be a girl growing up in a place so violent and unequal, where what are considered “girls’ issues” tend to be seen as irrelevant. So, I created a fictional story, where a 14-year-old girl Marina is organising her long-dreamed birthday party and hoping to find fun, friends and a first love, but she’s stuck in this city where killings are happening everywhere. She slowly learns not only about herself, but the world and its injustices.”
Co-director Tibúrcio’s life experience, particularly that of racism, similarly motivates him to tell this story: “Being a black middle-class person in Brazil made me experience racism in a very specific way, very much related to Marina’s experience. Recife, where I live, is also known for this reality. In a country as racially complex as ours, this history is dear and familiar to me and to many other non-white Brazilian people.”
Both co-directors will miss the quite different surrounds of Rotterdam in the winter as CineMart 2021 moves entirely online. “Rotterdam is really cool and I love walking around the city. So, I’m a bit sad because of it, but still excited for the online meetings” says Araújo. Tibúrcio echoes this sentiment, confident that “it will still be possible to get to know interesting people from the film industry and maybe make some business and partnerships regarding our film project.”
