First highlights of the 22nd edition of IndieLisboa 2025
This year we take a look at a past of reinvindication and emancipation, through the retrospective of Binka Jeliaskova. At the same time, we focus on the present through the work of film critic Charlie Shackleton. The Director’s Cut, on the other hand, follows a new narrative dedicated exclusively to heritage cinema, presenting a selection of films in newly restored digital prints: revisiting the history of cinema, recovering forgotten films, highlighting obscure gems and proposing new titles.
Retrospective Binka Jeliaskova – The struggle is a whisper
In this edition, we highlight filmmaker Binka Jeliaskova. A pioneer of Bulgarian cinema. She was the first woman in the country to direct a feature film. She used the 7th art form as a tool to express her struggles and challenge the system. However, this boldness came at a cost and four of her nine films were banned and only reached the public after the end of the ruling regime. Even so, her talent transcended borders, winning her international awards. She thus left a remarkable legacy for world cinema.
Focus Charlie Shackleton
Charlie Shackleton, winner of the NEXT Innovator Award at Sundance for Zodiac Killer Project (2025), is a British multimedia artist, filmmaker and essayist who uses film to explore and challenge the conventions and evolution of cinema itself. His work, such as Beyond Clueless and Fear Itself, examines genres such as teen comedy and horror, always with an investigative and critical approach.
Paint Drying is a 600-minute film that was made to challenge the censorship juggernaut of British cinema by forcing them to watch several hours of film of a white wall drying. This film will be shown in the PIDE censorship room at Cinema São Jorge.
During the festival, 11 of his works will be screened, 5 features and 7 shorts, some halfway between cinema and performance art. His work, with a touch of sarcasm, reflects millennial culture in a unique and provocative way.
Charlie revisits cinema’s past in order to deconstruct it, question it and project it into another time and with another contemporary and poetic gaze.
Director’s Cut
In this edition, the Director’s Cut section gets a new lease of life, focusing on restored films that reveal cinema classics and other more marginalised works that need to be recovered and that everyone should get to know.
Harry Kümel, Marva Nabili, the duo Jorge Bodanzky and Orlando Senna, Luis María Delgado and Stephan Sayadian are the filmmakers in the spotlight. Five fictional films that transport us to settings as diverse as a deserted palace in Belgium, a lorry journey through the Transamazon or a post-apocalyptic pornographic film.
