Colossal Youth (2006)

Colossal Youth

Pedro Costa

Portugal

Pedro Costa has been depicting the lives of the dispossessed of Portugal for over a decade by focusing his work on the ghetto neighborhood of Fontainhas in Lisbon, an area consisting of crowded, crumbling buildings where immigrants from Portugal's colonies and other desperate lives exist under depressed conditions. Poverty, mental illness, drug addiction and hopelessness rule the area with a tight grip and it seems none can escape its grasp. His Fontainhas catalogue consists of three feature films, two shorts and a museum piece depicting the community's life, death and what comes after as the area is torn down and the inhabitants are moved to new public housing projects. Now that this barrio is gone these films are almost certainly one of the few documents of its existence since many of the inhabitants haven't been given a voice outside their slum. Also, many are shown as being unable to read and write. Watching these films, it seems outrageous that a community could live in such third-world conditions in a first-world country.

Costa's first feature in Fontainhas was Ossos, released in 1997, in which a suicidal young woman has a baby, and when her attempts to kill herself and her baby fail, the baby's father takes it into the city to find a way to either sell or give the baby away. Both of the young parents become involved with a nurse living in the city who takes pity on them and tries to help them out. The film was shot on 35mm with a large crew and a professional cinematographer, Emmanuel Machuel, known for his work with director Robert Bresson. The look of the film is shadowy and washed out with much shot at night or on overcast days to emphasize the character's depressed state. The film seems realistic but follows a fictional narrative and seems to have many professional actors mixed in with locals playing smaller parts and filling the backgrounds. Ossos seems embryonic in the development of a style that will emerge in Costa's following films with its minimalist plot and long takes of subjects doing little. It also set the stages for the others because he met the characters that appear in the neighborhood during that first production.

Then came the release of In Vanda's Room, in 2000, revolving around a local girl and her sister, who both appeared in Ossos, who spend their time smoking heroin and talking in their room. The film also shows other heroin addicts shooting up in an adjacent house. These others are squatting in an abandoned building with no water, heat or electricity. Meanwhile, the neighborhood is slowly being torn down and everyone is worrying about where they will go. Costa abandoned the approach he made with his previous film and made this film with a skeleton crew, filming most of it himself with a small digital camera using mostly natural light with long static shots. Vanda and her sister Zita were locals to Fontainhas and both appeared in Ossos but had no other experience acting. Costa also chose not to use a script and just sat around filming what happened in the character's daily lives. Using digital cameras meant that he could shoot as much footage as he wanted without having to worry about the cost of film stock, so the film was much cheaper to produce and he could capture a reality that could only come from shooting without a preconceived notion of what would happen. His use of natural light has drawn comparisons to the painter, Vermeer, in his composition but digital filmmaking was still early in development so there is sacrifice in sharpness and clarity. As for substance, mostly characters just sat around talking and arguing about the heroin they were abusing while the sounds of construction crews knocking houses down can be heard in the distance. The film's running length is nearly three hours, making it a grueling ordeal to get through.

Colossal Youth is the third feature in this series, centered on an elderly Cape Verde immigrant named Ventura, in which the aftermath of the demolishment of the slum is depicted and he spends his days wandering the new projects seeking his old neighbors, whom he considers his “children.” Vanda, looking much older with a baby girl, returns and claims she has been clean for two years, but is still addicted to methadone. The film seems to contain a mix of unscripted real situations as they are happening similar to a documentary and some that are fictional. In a favorite scene that appears to be possibly recreated from reality, the film presents Ventura and some neighbors as they look on a funeral procession for Vanda's sister Zita and one man comments that “the usual poison” had taken her. Ventura remarks, “It wasn't the poison she took but the poison everyone took before she was born.” Vanda herself is unsure of her health and is afraid she will not be around long enough to raise her daughter.

Past and present also seem to blur together as Ventura seems to exist in both at the same moment. The only way to tell whether things are occurring in the present is whether they take place in the new projects with their graffiti-less white walls rather than the squalor of their old slum. In Fontainhas, Ventura lived with a young man and dictated a letter to him to write to his wife but he was illiterate so he could never write it down. Every time he repeated it, he added more so that the letter became quite long. Ventura may be mentally ill as he seems to operating in a different reality than that of his surroundings at times. In a scene, he and another neighbor describe what they “see” on the dirty walls of a house they are in and they seem to see images from their past. His neighbor remarks that they will not be able to “see” once “they give us those white rooms,” referring to their new homes in the projects with their clean, untarnished walls. There is a hint of sadness in having to leave their community despite its general state of decay.

Costa's use of the digital media does show growth since In Vanda's Room by showing a more sure hand as far as the composition of his images. The layout and editing is stronger and as a result the film is more beautiful and strange than it's predecessor. His style seems to take cues from the Dogme 95 movement in order to present a more realistic and truthful image of the ghetto he focuses on. Dogme 95 was an avant-garde movement in film that had a set of rules to create a more natural filmmaking style. He does violate some of their “Vows of Chastity” by using sound that is not produced at the time of filming as well as filming in a format other than 35mm and receiving credit as director but follows many of the other rules by using natural light, filming on location and only having music in scenes in which the music is actively being listened to. He avoids all special effects and gimmicks and even goes one step further by using only local non-actors as his cast.

Costa followed Colossal Youth with two shorts featuring Ventura for different film festivals. He spends his time hanging out with a homeless friend and a bit more of Portugal is shown as the features had no panorama views of the scenery and mostly took place indoors or the tight spaces of Fontainhas. One is titled Tarrafal, named for a Portuguese concentration camp in Cape Verde where African leaders were jailed for fighting against Portuguese colonialism, and the other is titled The Rabbit Hunters. Just before Colossal Youth he released a museum piece called Little Boy Male, Little Girl Female containing footage from both In Vanda's Room and Colossal Youth. Two films existed side by side, one showing interior shots and the other exterior shots in Fontainhas, while ambient outdoor sounds of people mingling and shouting are heard.

While In Vanda's Room is more realistic, it was a bit of a drag to get through, and while Colossal Youth has a similar long length it is a bit easier to watch. This could be attributed to the mix of realism and constructed premises to create something more interesting in form. I could still not call this work commercial at all. Like his piece that was created for a museum installation, his films may actually be better enjoyed if seen in an art museum as the entertainment factor on these is low. It will be hard for anyone that has never been exposed to avant-garde filmmaking to get through either of these films due their length and format. Ossos may be an easier watch but it is also inferior to both of its sequels in many ways, mainly because Costa's style was still in its formative stages. Outside of the documentary format, this is the closest you could get to the daily reality of those existing on the fringes of society which are often ignored by those more fortunate. Through Costa their tale is told and and their voices are heard, but their tale is full of heartbreak and despair even though the characters themselves never seem too introspective. It is unnecessary to see all three films if you have interest in one because their connection's are thin and in my opinion, Colossal Youth, is the director's most important work on this subject.

Rating: 8/10

-Ryan Sallows