Hal Hartley is one of the best-kept secrets of American independent cinema – a true cult auteur who has never betrayed the meaning of the word “independent”. Since the late 1980s, he has built a distinctive body of work where dark humor and a love for language intersect with a philosophical and ironic view of the world. A rare, methodical and free filmmaker, he has always filmed between absurdity and tenderness, turning the everyday into a moral fable.
He made a masterful debut with The Unbelievable Truth (1989), one of his most beloved comedies, a touching and insightful satire about idealistic love, capitalist moralization at home, and the need for work one can love. The film will be screened on November 7th, in Room 3 of Cinema São Jorge, and will be presented by the director himself, as, indeed, all screenings.
The following year, he directed Trust (1990), widely regarded as one of the essential works of American independent cinema of the 1990s, about the encounter between two misfit young people with complicated family lives. Told with Hartley’s characteristic verbal agility and biting humor, the film won the Waldo Salt Screenwriting Award at the 1991 Sundance Film Festival. The filmmaker will attend the screening on November 8th, also in Room 3 of Cinema São Jorge.
Hartley's remaining work follows the line of a cinema firmly rooted in ambiguity, and linguistic precision, creating key movies featured in this retrospective such as Simple Men (1992); Amateur (1994); Flirt (1995); Henry Fool (1997), winner of the Best Screenplay Award in Competition at Cannes; Fay Grim (2006); and Ned Rifle (2014), the last ones a trilogy. His latest work, Where to Land (2025), will have its European premiere in the LEFFEST Official Competition.
The screening of Ned Rifle on November 16th at Cinema Nimas will feature a masterclass by Hartley, who will be present at all screenings in the retrospective.