I Only Rest in the Storm

Plot

Sergio travels to Guinea-Bissau to work for an NGO as an environmental engineer on a road project between the desert and the forest. There, he becomes entangled in an intimate yet unbalanced relationship with two inhabitants of the city, Diara and Gui. As neo-colonial dynamics among the expatriate community unravel, this fragile bond becomes his only refuge from an impending collapse into solitude or barbarism.

About I Only Rest in the Storm

I Only Rest in the Storm (Portuguese: O Riso e a Faca, lit. "The Laugh and the Knife") is a 2025 drama film produced, co-written and directed by Pedro Pinho. Starring Sérgio Coragem, Cleo Diára and Jonathan Guilherme, it follows a white Portuguese environmental engineer who takes a job position in Guinea-Bissau, and his complicated relationship with two black locals. The film had its world premiere in the Un Certain Regard section of the 78th Cannes Film Festival on 17 May 2025, where it was nominated for the Queer Palm and Diára won the section's Best Actress prize. It was theatrically released in Portugal on 30 October by Uma Pedra no Sapato.

From Wikipedia, CC BY-SA 4.0.

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