© João Pedro Rodrigues

JOÃO PEDRO RODRIGUES – The Ornithologist

LAR Gallery, Lagos
Wed 18 OCT, 21h30

Film / PT-FR-BR / 2016 / 118' / M16
Free entrance

Fernando, a solitary ornithologist, is looking for endangered black storks along a remote river in northern Portugal, when he is swept away by the rapids.
Rescued by a couple of Chinese pilgrim girls on their way to Santiago de Compostela, he plunges into a dark, eerie forest, trying to get back on track.
But as he encounters unexpected and uncanny obstacles and people who put him to the test, Fernando is driven to extreme, transformative actions. Gradually he becomes a different man: inspired, multifaceted, and finally enlightened.


Directed by: João Pedro Rodrigues
Written by: João Pedro Rodrigues and João Rui Guerra da Mata
With: Paul Hamy, Xelo Cagiao, João Pedro Rodrigues, Han Wen, Chan Suan, Juliane Elting
Cinematography: Rui Poças A.I.P.
Sound: Nuno Carvalho
Production Designer / Art Director: João Rui Guerra da Mata
Editing: Raphaël Lefèvre
Original Music: Séverine Ballon
Costume Designer: Patrícia Dória
First Assistant Director: Paulo Guilherme
Producers: João Figueiras, Diogo Varela Silva, Vincent Wang, Antoine Barraud, Gustavo Ángel, Alex García and Maria Fernanda Scardino
Production: Blackmaria, House on Fire and Ítaca Filmes

João Pedro Rodrigues began by studying Biology to become an ornithologist, but soon gave it up for cinema and graduated from Lisbon Film School. His work explores human desire in all its guises and disguises, reflecting the multifarious history of film, from classic genres to documentary and experimental film. He directed five features: PHANTOM (2000), ODETE (2005), TO DIE LIKE A MAN (2009), THE LAST TIME I SAW MACAU (2012) – co-directed with João Rui Guerra da Mata – and THE ORNITHOLOGIST (2016). He also directed several shorts, some with Guerra da Mata, a body of work they like to call their “Asian films”. Rodrigues’s films premiered and won prizes at the world’s foremost film festivals, including Cannes, Venice, Locarno and Berlin.