A brief inventory of little stumbles

or

say the word void out loud and watch it rise up in your throat and fill your mouth.

To create a group on WhatsApp open the app and in the conversations tab click on “new group,” name the group, and then add the participants.

Late June, there was almost twenty of us. One photo after another, something from the previous one continued into the next: the device of the first encounter. The presentation.

The time of the correspondence, the rhythm of the messages, the charge of reading, the slowness of the response, a certain tiredness, and some moments of euphoria. And doubts, always doubts. “Can we use our own image?” What images are ok?  

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How to not fill the edges?  How to turn a blank – and black – space into an image? How to write in the margins? How to create in the gap? How to sew fragments while leaving the thread loose?    

Still unnamed, the montage appears in the middle of the conversation:

“We could start with this one, and then we move on to another photo taken from the window. It has a better connection”. Cinema is moving things around. Positioning what arrives from the world , once, twice, three times until something happens, even if that happening is exhaustion itself.

Several times, the devices we proposed asked them to tell us about memories in which we had not taken part. On those occasions, our participation did not seem right.  It was rather when invitations, materialized, as if a parallel device, invented on the spur of the moment: “And what are you going to do for the exercise? I have a challenge for you: get the list of songs that the teacher gave us, listen to it, and imagine yourself in the room, tell me what was your sensation”.

The image also convokes: “Pause for the hummingbird”. A voice asks that the film suspends itself for an instant. Cinema is nothing, if not a standing still, for a bird to pass.

Our brief inventory of little stumbles emerged from a rearrangement of gestures that came to us, from superimposing scenes – perhaps this was the only possible form of contact for a group that had never been all together presencially in the same room. Faced with this concrete (mis) encounter, the image becomes tactile, we lean into one another watching the recording of our daily lives pass by, beside, above,  in front of one another.

“São Gonçalo, saudades de tu [missing you]*”

What if it were possible to trace a map with the sound of a voice? Draw a cartography with the eyes? São Gonçalo, I’m not sure how to say it, but something happens to me when I see your name written on a notebook sheet, that makes me want to rewrite, reinscribe, paper into film.

* saudade is an untranslatable word combining meanings of longing, homesickness and desire. For those whom Portuguese is not their mother tongue, we hope you can get a glimpse of these in our film.

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Us

Cintya Ferreira

Resident of Tribobó São Gonçalo, Cintya studies cinema at Universidade Federal Fluminense (UFF). She is interested in archival imagery and sound experimentation. 

Gabriel Vieira

Gabriel studies cinema at UFF and has directed and edited various shorts.  He works on the Cinema Document Project coordinated by Professor and Filmmaker Miguel Freire. Born and raised in São Gonçalo, he lives in the Porto da Pedra neighborhood.

Mariana de Lima

Mariana studies cinema at UFF. Experiments with exercises in montage, photography and criticism. In between the city of Goiás and Niterói.

Dudu

A student at Diaz Andre high school, really likes electronic games, not much into reading but tries whenever he can.

Gaby

Gaby is a student at Odyssea state school. She is 15 years old and lives in the Jóquei neighborhood in São Gonçalo and is a student of the teacher Raquel. Loves to read and write.

Izadora

Izadora is a student at Diaz André, located in Pacheco, and I live in Sacramento. I really appreciate reading and the arts in general, also the teaching passed on is fascinating! I love dancing, singing …

Karina

Student of Diaz André high school, she lives in the Pacheco neighborhood of São Gonçalo. She likes to write. She enjoys music, dance, reading and writing alittle, loves adventures. 

Kaylane Rodrigues

She is from Jóquei! Jóquei! Student of the best teacher ever, Raquel. She is 17 years old.

Kaylanne

She is 15 years old and a resident of Coelho, student at Odyssea state school, and a student of the teacher Raquel.

Larissa

She is 15 years old and lives in the Jóquei neighborhood and is a student of the teacher Raquel.

Maria Clara Carrielo

Maria is a student at the Clélia Nanci Institute of Education, where she is studying teach teacher training. She loves Portuguese language and to write.

Maria Clara (Zameii)

She likes to study, play Free Fire, read poetry, and much more. She is a student at Diaz André. She is  restless and likes to be helpful.

Raquel Danielli Mota

Raquel has been teaching classes in Portuguese, English and literature in Rio de Janeiro state schools since 2007.

Renata Targino

Renata is a teacher of Portuguese language and literature in the state schools of Rio de Janeiro.

Thais

Thais is from the Jóquei neighborhood in São Gonçalo. She is 17 years old and is a student of Raquel.