The hotel breathes. It rustles. It waits. Yessica is the only one who hears it, the only one who sees what’s writhing beneath the surface. Today, she takes action.
From Gonçalo Almeida we have seen the recent, multi-award-winning Atom & Void, in which, through the journey of a spider, we are able to sense the end of the world. Almeida has a remarkable ability to create other worlds within our own, without resorting to artificiality. He uses the composition of sound and image to create living organisms that can be objects, animals or people. In his new film Quietness, the hotel is one such living being in search of its own space. It breathes, gives orders, moves slowly amongst the tourists and staff until Yessica hears it, and from this point the film unfolds into a realistic phantasmagoria, in which nothing frightens us, yet everything is worrying or unsettling. Once again, in just a few minutes, Almeida manages to pull us out of the safety of our cinema seats, making us glance to the side just to check that everything is alright. As one of the new voices in Portuguese cinema, this filmmaker, born in Santiago do Cacém, is getting better and better and is well worth watching. (Miguel Valverde)
