Abstract

PICARRA, Maria do Carmo. The ballad of the salt sea: cinematographic travel through landscapes without men. Finisterra [online]. 2015, n.100, pp.143-153. ISSN 0430-5027.  https://doi.org/10.18055/Finis7872.

This paper analyses why the film 1º cruzeiro de férias às colónias ocidentais (first Holiday Cruise to the Western Colonies), commissioned to the noted art photographer San Payo, was projected only once during the Estado Novo. This voyage movie, subgenre of colonial cinematic propaganda, is one of the first works of official propaganda intended to show that “Portugal is not a small country”: therefore, to (re)build the country through a new imperial map. This film is symptomatic of “mobility culture”, identified by Jean Brunhes; its purpose is to testify to the rule of imperial space through new communication technologies. Unaware of this phenomenon of acceleration, this movie may have been a victim of the shattered vision of day-to-day life in the colonies. To fulfil its design to project the nations' greatness, it might have lacked an even more intimate movement that would behold compassion (Orlando Ribeiro)?

Keywords : Colonial cinema; imperial map; nation; travel movie; propaganda.

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