Canijo's new film to hit the screens

by Vitor Pinto

09/10/2008 - Over a year after its world premiere at the Venice Film Festival, João Canijo's latest film Misbegotten finally hits local screens today, after several postponements.

After Dark Night (2004), the director gets back to the classics to build a story that can be seen as an adaptation of the Greek myth of Electra. It is set – as most of his films – in the Portuguese countryside and is another of Canijo's portraits of bruised people living in forgotten places, where tradition walks hand by hand with family secrets and desires for revenge.

The film features newcomer Anabela Moreira as a girl mourning the death of her father, for which she seeks revenge on her mother. The cast also includes Fernando Luís, Márcia Breia and Gonçalo Waddington.

Produced by Paulo Branco for Clap Filmes, the films is not however released by Branco's usual distribution company Atalanta, but by Costa do Castelo Filmes.

Other European productions with theatrical releases this week are Fatih Akin's award-winning title The Edge of Heaven [trailer, film focus] (Atalanta), Jean-Paul Salomé's Female Agents [trailer] (Lusomundo) and Tom Kalin's Savage Grace (Vitória Filmes).