Arabian Nights: Volume 1 - The Restless One

As Mil e Uma Noites: Volume 1, O Inquiet, feature film, drama, Portugal, 2015

DIRECTED BY: Miguel Gomes

Arabian Nights: Volume 1 - The Restless One

CAST:
Crista Alfaiate (Maria),
Miguel Gomes,
Maria Rueff,
Bruno Bravo,
Rogério Samora

SCRIPT:
Telmo Churro,
Miguel Gomes,
Mariana Ricardo

PHOTOGRAPHY:
Mário Castanheira (segment "A História do Galo e do Fogo"),
Sayombhu Mukdeeprom

Synopsis:

Bees are dying because their honeycombs are under attack from hornets; workers are laid off because the creditors of a shipyard require to get paid. The director, looking straight into the camera, hints at the similarity between the two catastrophes, and then confesses not to know how to connect them, breaks down and runs away from his own set. He is not the only person unfit for the job. Firemen do not put out fires because they lack the equipment and men as well as enthusiasm. The only people who know what they are doing and have the will to work and the shipyard workers, but they cannot do their job because domestic production was destroyed by financial committees, similarly to how the bees honeycombs were ruined by the hornets. The first part of the trilogy reveals all this through a series of surreal stories about Portugal in the time of crisis, framed by a voice from another time, the voice of Scheherazade. It makes us laugh, crosses the limits of good taste and insults without hesitation…

color, digital, 125 min

Trailer