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"Colo" shows a Portuguese family's struggle to make ends meet
while the father is unemployed and the mother is exhausted from
working long hours in a country still recovering from an
economic depression earlier this decade.
Unable to pay their bills, the family's electricity gets cut off
and they resort to using candles and charging their mobile
phones at a neighbor's apartment. The father eats food he finds
in the rubbish and their daughter dodges fares as she does not
have money for the school bus.
While the characters in the film do not show their political
views, director Teresa Villaverde said it was likely that people
in such situations could swerve to the hard right.
"With unemployment and everything like that, people get lost and
then comes someone like Donald Trump or, in Europe, ... these
new right-wing people like Marine Le Pen," Villaverde said after
the film's premiere on Wednesday.
"There are many countries that have had a long democratic
tradition and to our surprise we see the return of right-wing
parties across Europe - we thought we'd never see this again,"
she said.
The film seeks to portray a family crisis and loneliness by
showing how people who live together in a small apartment still
do not really know each other and how existing problems are
exacerbated by their lack of money, Villaverde said.
The mother loses her evening job and her relationship with her
husband breaks down as she wonders whether he will ever get
work. They end up going to live with different relatives while
their daughter moves into a fisherman's hut by the sea.
"Colo" is one of 18 films in competition at the festival that
runs until Feb. 19.
(Editing by Robin Pomeroy)
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