MORTU NEGA
Special Features: New 4K Restoration
[THOSE WHOM DEATH REFUSED]
It is no surprise that Flora Gomes’ debut feature would be an epic and gripping meditation on revolution — after all, it was resistance fighter Amílcar Cabral who spurred Gomes to study filmmaking at the ICAIC in Cuba as a youth. Split into three distinct chapters that cover the end of Guinea-Bissau’s war of independence from Portugal through the immediate postwar years, MORTU NEGA centers its narrative on Diminga (Bia Gomes), the devoted wife of a wounded soldier who enters the fray herself to be at his side. At the war’s conclusion, Diminga retires home to care for her husband while navigating the bureaucratic apparatus that has emerged. Gomes gives equal weight to the intense nature of the guerilla war waged by the resistance (captured in an evocative documentary style) and the challenges of forming a working government that will provide for its people. In doing so, he both pays tribute to those who won Guinea-Bissau’s independence and criticizes the failures of those who gained power. DIR/SCR Flora Gomes; SCR Manuel Rambout Barcelos, David Lang; PROD Maria Cecilia Fonseca. Guinea-Bissau, 1988, color, 96 min. In Crioulo and Portuguese with English subtitles. NOT RATED
Restored in 2025 by The Film Foundation’s World Cinema Project and Cineteca di Bologna at L’Immagine Ritrovata laboratory, in collaboration with Flora Gomes. Funding provided by the Hobson/Lucas Family Foundation. Special thanks to Arsenal – Institut für Film und Videokunst. Restored in 4K from the original Super16mm camera negative and the 35mm magnetic sound, stored at LTC Laboratories. Grading supervised by Dominique Gentil and Flora Gomes.
Run Time: 96 Minutes
Opening Date: Friday, May 22, 2026
Genre: Drama
