World Cinema Day | Francisco Dias: The importance of Cinema is in sharing the "experience with other people".

At only 23 years of age, Francisco Dias, finalist of the Master's in Cinema at Universidade Católica, is already taking the first steps in his career as a filmmaker. In 2020, he won the prize for best film in the Take One! competition at the Vila do Conde Short Film Festival, with I don't like 5 p.m., a short film developed during his Bachelor's degree at the School of Arts.

"The film tells in a poetic and almost dialogue-free way the story of my first love, an encounter, and then, in the end, a drifting apart," explains Francisco. "The competition was fierce and I was very happy to have won," shares the young filmmaker. With the award, which marks the "beginning of a career in cinema", the film went on to be represented by an agency and presented "in other festivals, not only in Portugal, but in other European countries," and is now available on the Filmin streaming platform.

For Francisco, his passion for cinema began in high school. Divided between Cinema and Aerospace Engineering, he chose to do a Degree in Sound and Image at the School of Arts of the Porto Regional Centre, after talking to former students and visiting the University. "I felt that Católica would be the best option," he says. A conviction that he reaffirmed in his Master's degree.

A course that he considers to have been very liberating. And "important to become the person I am today," he adds. Among the strong points of the University, he highlights all the "camera, lighting and sound equipment" and the image and sound post-production studios made available to him, as well as the capacity to "develop creativity, artistic thinking and research methods". Tools that he believes will "accompany him in the future".

Francisco describes the career he has chosen as one of great responsibility. "The role of a filmmaker today is of nuclear importance," he says. "In a world where there are many images that are fabricated," he believes it is important "to convey something more true, to share real emotions, and to represent those who deserve to be represented." That's why for his Masters project he chose "to make a short film on the way the advance of the sea and coastal erosion affect the life of a community that lives by the sea"

As for the future of Portuguese cinema, he hopes for the creation of "a more solid industry, and an effort to show the Portuguese people cinema made in the country". Especially in his home city, Porto. Here he highlights the initiatives of Luís Costa and José Magro, "two students from the Universidade Católica who have started their own agencies and are developing very interesting work" in cinema.

Although he believes that streaming platforms like Filmin are a way of bringing cinema to more people, particularly short films and works by young artists, Francisco cannot give up the cinematic experience. For the artist, going to the cinema is important because of the scale, the quality, but above all the "presence of the audience, that is, being able to share the experience with other people."

This is why on this World Cinema Day he recommends three different films to see in the cinema or at home: Sem Deixar Rastos, "a story set in the 1980s, in Warsaw, of a young man who was killed by the police"; O Triângulo da Tristeza, which satirizes the extremely rich; and Alma Viva, "the Portuguese candidate for the Oscars", which represents "an authentic portrait of a family from Trás-os-Montes."

Watch the young director's 1st short film here