Januar '26: Leonor Teles
“Balada de um Batráquio”, Digitalvideo, 11 min, 2016
„Es war einmal, bevor die Menschen kamen, da waren alle Lebewesen frei und konnten miteinander leben“, erzählt die Stimme aus dem Off. „Alle Tiere tanzten zusammen und waren unermesslich glücklich. Nur einer war nicht zu dem Fest eingeladen – der Frosch. In seiner Wut über diese Ungerechtigkeit beging er Selbstmord.“ Was Roma und Frösche gemeinsam haben, ist, dass sie niemals unsichtbar sind oder unbemerkt bleiben.
In ihrem Film verwebt die junge Regisseurin Leonor Teles die Lebensumstände der Roma im heutigen Portugal mit den Erinnerungen an eine vergangene Zeit. Teles ist alles andere als eine passive Beobachterin, sondern entscheidet sich bewusst dafür, sich einzubringen und Stellung zu beziehen. Als dritte Säule etabliert sie eine aktive angewandte Performancekunst, die in die filmische Erzählung integriert wird. Dadurch verwandelt sie das „Es war einmal“ in ein „Es gibt“.
DOCK 20: In „Balada de um Batráquio“, you combine a fable-like story with real situations and encounters. How do you work with storytelling, performance, and observation in your films?
Leonor Teles: Observing is usually the first step, but for “Balada” I really wanted to take some action. Therefore the rest of the film was design with that in mind. I wanted to do something — not just address and illustrate a situation of prejudice and racism —, so that’s where the perform enters.
D20: The film uses myth and folklore to address present-day discrimination against the Romani community. What does working with these forms allow you to say that a more traditional documentary might not?
LT: It allows me to explore different approaches to the themes in question. It’s important not to be stuck to a formula when it comes to film and especially in the short form. If we talk about themes like discrimination I feel fresh approaches can catch the eye for the subject. Besides, the idea was always to create something very short and catchy, almost playful and not so serious, because in the end if you stop to think about the purpose of the porcelain frogs everything is quite ridiculous, so the film must also had the same tone.
D20: You appear in the film yourself, instead of staying in the background. How important is your own position as a filmmaker within the work, and how does it shape your images and narratives?
LT: It was important to be myself intervening in the narrative. I couldn’t have ask for other people to take action instead of me, not in this particularly case. The idea for the film started from a play I used to do with my mother: one day we were going to enter the places and smash the frogs. So in my imagination it had to be me… I couldn’t ask nobody else to take my place in the story.
D20: Your films often move between quiet, intimate moments and more direct political gestures. How do you develop a visual language that holds these tensions?
LT: By working a lot on the editing process, to cut with precision and to know how to use time to create suspension and surprise, and how to balance them. Of course the ideas come from the writing process, the editing allows to precise them.
D20: In „Balada de um Batráquio“, different times seem to overlap — oral tradition, memory, and the present. How do you think about time and repetition in your filmmaking?
LT: I guess time is perceived differently by each of us as individuals. I’m kind of obsessed with memory, so I use that as substance for my work. And with past memories comes repetition and overthinking, like a sort of cycling that finds its way in a form of film.
D20: Shown in the context of Wunderblock BETA, which looks at how media can question dominant narratives, how do you see your films working not only through content, but also through their form and structure?
LT: I don’t think is possible to separate them. Form and language are part of the content as well. It’s like each film should have its own way, and not just copy something that was already made a dozen times. For me, it’s really important to “listen” to what the film needs and conceive it’s unique structure around it, sometimes it’s a more classic form, sometimes more experimental. Cinema has this power of allowing us to work in different layers of experiment until we achieve the “right” one.
Interview: Anne Zühlke
Leonor Teles (1992) wurde in Vila Franca de Xira in einer Familie mit Wurzeln in der Roma-Gemeinschaft geboren. Sie schloss ein Studium des Films an der Escola Superior de Teatro e Cinema – IPL mit Spezialisierung in den Bereichen Bildgestaltung und Regie ab (2010–2013). Im Jahr 2015 absolvierte sie den Masterstudiengang Audiovisuelles und Multimedia an der Escola Superior de Comunicação Social (IPL). Rhoma Acans (2013), ein noch während des Filmstudiums realisierter Film, wurde auf mehreren internationalen Filmfestivals gezeigt und ausgezeichnet, darunter das Clermont-Ferrand IFF, das Munich IFFS, das FICUNAM, das IndieLisboa IFF und das Curtas de Vila do Conde IFF. Balada de um Batráquio, ihr erster Film, gewann 2016 auf der Berlinale den Goldenen Bären für den Besten Kurzfilm. Derzeit arbeitet Leonor Teles im Bereich Bildgestaltung und an ihren persönlichen Dokumentarfilmprojekten.
