About Us

Frames — Portuguese Film Festival grasps the idea of cinema as a gesture of resistance against banality and inequality, searching for images, sounds, and narratives able to provoke and move audiences. Our bet is on author and independent cinema, capable of defying conventions and preconceived ideas.

Our festival aims at becoming a significant cultural gathering platform in the cities where the festival takes place. We seek to promote the most recent, original, and creative content within the Portuguese cinematographic landscape and to introduce new and talented Portuguese filmmakers to the Swedish public. The festival is also a great opportunity to deepen the dialogue between the Swedish audience and Portuguese-speaking communities.

Our History

This initiative originated from the efforts of the Portuguese Youth Association in Sweden - FAPS Jovem, wishing the festival could become a significant cultural gathering platform for the Portuguese community in Sweden. The festival seeks to promote the most recent, original and creative content within the Portuguese cinematographic panorama, as well as introduce new and talented Portuguese filmmakers to the Swedish public. Cinema, the main focus of the event, is broadened by other cultural expressions, such as literature, debates and music events.

The first edition of Frames Festival — The **first edition** of Frames - Portuguese Film Festival

took place in Stockholm in **November 2013**.

Frames memory — The second edition took place in Stockholm and Gothenburg in November 2014 under the theme **Memory**.

What does the act of remembering to entail? How do we relate to our past in individual and collective ways?

Frames Roots — In February 2016, under the theme **Roots**

the festival spread for the first time to three different cities - Stockholm, Gothenburg and Västerås.

In February 2017, the theme was **Social Tales**

placing focus on issues such as social organization, inequality and discrimination.
This edition also featured the first Competitive Section of the festival - Frames Shorts

The 2018 edition had the theme "Frames on Women" — In March 2018, Frames had its fifth edition under the theme **Frames On Women**.

This edition was all about bringing forward the complex problem of the representation of women in film and giving fair visibility to women through Portuguese cinema.

We had interview with proeminent female directors

Some of the people behind Frames Festival spoke in the opening night

Luísa Sobral, a portuguese singer, graced us with her presence in the opening night

The 2019 edition had the theme "Frames Colective" — The power of a society as a whole.

In March 2019, **Frames Collective** was the theme.
The aim was to redefine the idea of the group through cinema: narratives and aesthetics, ways of thinking and the concept of collectivism.

Frames Collective had adance performance by React! actions moving.

React! actions moving group interacted with the audience

Frames Colective opening night had guest speakers

There was a sizeable audience. We were totally unaware the pandemic in 2020 would make this type of gathering impossible.

Portuguese food tasters had to be there for the opening night

The 2020 edition had the theme "Frames Love Stories" — And then came 2020…

With the advent of the pandemic, we turned online and made our first ever online festival using a movie stream platform, under the theme **Love Stories**, aiming at redefining, rethinking and questioning contemporary dynamics of love through Portuguese cinema.
This edition truly tested how to stay together while being further apart.

We used a streaming platform for movies and used facebook and instagram heavily. This is a screenshot from one of our Instagram stories.

Reactions in Instagram from people watching the movies

About Us

Our History

And now it’s time for 2022…

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