Maybe we can consider Sérgio Tréfaut’s movies provocative, in a language that it’s not indifferent in political terms. Tréfaut has opinions, he is critical, and in his movies gives spaces to voices that usually are silent. Frequently invited to national and international film festivals, and multi-awarded director, Sérgio Tréfaut admits that the movies he makes are about the things he cares about and respects. «By making them, I grow with them and deal with the questions that I care about», said in an interview about contemporary Portuguese film. His most recent movie, The Bride, was in the official selection of Venice Film Festival, in the section Orizzonti. The movie was a result of a trip to Iraq, where Tréfaut wanted to show the hypocrisy of the American politics of free speech and freedom in a country wounded by war. «With the rising of ISIS, this documentary died by itself, but, in another way, I was surprised to discover all the Europeans that were willing to enter the Daesh cell. That made me change the focus of the story», said the director.
Lisboetas (2004), A Cidade dos Mortos (2009), Alentejo, Alentejo (2013), Treblinka (2016), and Paraíso (2021) are some of his most emblematics movies from a director that was born in São Paulo, in 1965, but ended up living in Paris and Lisbon, since he was 10 years old, because of the dictatorship in Brazil. Forty years have passed and Tréfaut went back to his country, and lives in Rio de Janeiro.