In The Intense Now

Tied by a first person narrative thread, film footage from May ’68 in France, the Prague Spring, and the echo of the protests on the other side of the Atlantic (in Rio de Janeiro) are elegantly interweaved with clips from the camera of the director’s mother, who witnessed the Great Proletarian Cultural Revolution in China as a tourist. A reflection on the nature of images of history, which triggers a series of questions: Who films them, why, and how? What can the archive reveal of itself without the viewer having to consult its historical context? What sorts of images are born of fear, of rapture, of urgency, of joy?