Portuguese cinema has long received international recognition, especially at leading film festivals. An important part of this recognition is due to Portuguese animated film, which has received notable and illustrious awards. Through its varied approaches, BAP Studio, based in Porto, has been fundamental in reclaiming cinema as a space for stories, characters and emotions. Founded in 2011 as the animation wing of production company Bando à Parte, in 2018 it became an independent organisation, a cooperative formed by a collective (Alexandra Ramires, David Doutel, Laura Gonçalves, Rodrigo Areias, Vasco Sá and Vitor Hugo Rocha), all writers who share a common vision of film as a means of experiencing perspectives and lives beyond our own existence.

One of BAP Studio’s foremost characteristics is its collaborative spirit, so it is not uncommon to see the director of one film listed in the credits for another as producer, screenwriter or involved in the team of animators; in parallel, there is a set of themes that spans the different films and reveals points of contact, creating subtle connections between the films as if they were in dialogue or even influencing each other. Quase me Lembro, by Dimitri Mihajlovic and Miguel Lima, dives into the mind of someone who is unsure of their own memories, and this disorientation persists throughout the film in a kind of sensory and emotional vertigo. Artefacts from other times, masks and mirrors decode a puzzle of personal references within a perpetual flux of ghost images: the grandfather and bird, trapped by the walls of this house, symbols of a promise of freedom now lost.

Alento, by Leonor Pacheco, unfolds in permanent, unstoppable transmutation. The effect is hypnotic — a circular movement, as of a bewitched clock, is the only constant — and we try not to blink, so as not to miss a second of this enigmatic composition: what is this fascinating organism, that demands our undivided attention? Homem do Lixo, by Laura Gonçalves, pays tribute to the memory of the director’s uncle, Manel Botão, who, having secretly emigrated to France, finds a new life for objects he comes across in his work as a refuse collector. Botão thus stands alongside Agnès Varda’s “gleaners”. As Laura Gonçalves confirms regarding the film, “the beauty of these people touched me in such a deeply compelling way, that I could only venerate them, while at the same time I saw my uncle as joining their anonymity, living off the ‘rubbish’ of others”. The film is in continuous movement, with transitions that achieve what shouldn’t be possible, between different times, as if everything were part of a single shot — as if memories and the present were one and the same.

Directed by Alexandre Siqueira, Purpleboy is another film about transformations, a metaphor for the search for identity. The film’s protagonist is Óscar, a transgender boy, a seed germinating, as the director says: “Since Óscar grows in the ground and his body is still developing, his parents don’t know their child’s sex. Nevertheless, the father is certain the child is a boy. By contrast, the mother’s instinct tells her the child is a girl.” By playing with preconceived ideas about what we associate with different genders, the film imaginatively uses this uncertainty to depict the drama of those who suffer the pressures of expectations and prejudices. Elo, by Alexandra Ramires, shares several points in common with Purpleboy: the fear of acknowledging differences and feeling comfortable with things beyond the norm, of escaping established patterns and expectations. Beautifully filmed with the eye of someone moved by their own characters, this metaphor of two figures, who end up complementing each other in surprising ways, is also a message about keeping faith in a more hopeful future, even during dark hours.

A fable about mundane objects that take on a life of their own, Das Gavetas Nascem Sons, by Vitor Hugo Rocha, builds an imaginary world where drawers lead to impossible corridors, as if by magic, revealing their life-filled interiors, as enchanting as a kaleidoscope of ideas. Garrano, by David Doutel and Vasco Sá, continues this duo’s series of melancholic dramas with meticulously constructed narratives, with a realism that brings them close to a more classic approach. A child and a horse, who share a special connection in the middle of a sad existence, find themselves in a tragic situation resulting from the tunnel vision experienced by those unable to imagine a different future. Percebes, by another duo, Alexandra Ramires and Laura Gonçalves, is also the continuation of earlier documentary work. Using audio recordings from interviews with various people living in the Algarve, the directors confect a moving, perceptive and highly contemporary portrait of people who feel their cities no longer belong to them. By linking this to the ‘percebe’ barnacle, and its resilience, this is also a tribute to the Algarve people and their good-humoured persistence in the face of adversity. The moods vary, but the portraits always contain a personal depth full of empathy for the human condition. This is a common thread to BAP Studio’s films, which, in their many different forms, enrich our view of the world.