The director and cinematographer Luiza Calagian is from São Paulo, Brazil. She has a cinematography degree from the International School of Film and TV (EICTV) in Cuba where she also took a master’s in creative documentary. Her work has screened at festivals around the world. She is the founder of the independent production company Mata Fechada Films. Luiza Calagian believes that the craft of cinema is a spell, capable of transmuting reality and enchanting the world. She is currently developing her debut feature film.
The trans filmmaker Rosa Caldera grew up in a favela in São Paulo, Brazil and first studied sociology followed by filmmaking at the International School of Cinema and TV (EICTV) in Cuba. They are a member of the Talentos Paradiso network and a co-founder of the Association of Trans Professionals in Audiovisual in Brazil, as well as of the Maloka Filmes production company. Their films have been selected for festivals around the world.
What was your starting point for „Anba dlo“?
Anba Dlo, meaning „underwater“ in Haitian Creole, is a key concept in Haitian Vodou, one of the main religions of Haiti. It represents a spiritual space of deep waters that souls must cross to reach Ginen, the realm of Gods and ancestors. This film was born from the encounter between the waters of mourning of two Latin American friends who were foreigners in Cuba.
Luiza and Rosa are two Brazilians who left their country in search of better opportunities to study film at a prestigious school in Cuba, EICTV. There they lived together for three years, sharing their daily experiences, but also their deepest pains. During this period, both were shaken by the loss of a loved one in their home country, and were challenged by the need to process these losses from another country, in a reality and territory completely separate from their home. This shared journey ended up uniting them in the search for healing through creation, and led to the encounter with Berline Charles, the protagonist of the film, who had also gone through the same situation in her country, Haiti. Together, Luiza, Rosa and Berline found in Anba Dlo the welcome and the tools to navigate the deep waters of mourning, paying tribute to those who had passed away, delving into their pain and also into their spirituality, and coming out the other side transformed.
Do you have a favorite moment in the film? Which one and why this one in particular?
LUIZA: My favorite moment of the movie is the okra bath Nadia’s friend gives her, because the very same thing happened to me, and so this scene was born from a very painful but very dear memory – such is the complexity of mourning. On the early days of my boyfriend’s sudden death, I went to my Yalorixa, the spiritual leader in the Candomblé religion, and she took care of me, among many ways, through a bath such as this. That was the day I understood I was not alone in this journey of grief, which was in a way also a process of death and rebirth for me. Very few days after that I had to go back to Cuba, and face the need to cross this mourning so very far from everything and everyone I knew and loved.
This process was only possible because of the strength my spirituality and the community I found there gave me, and I think this scene represents that in a beautiful way. This moment is a ritual mixed between three religions, Brazilian Candomblé, Cuban Santería and Haitian Vodou. In that sense, to me it synthesizes the exiled nature of the grief Rosa, Berline and me – and so many people in our continent – had to cross, being immigrants far from our homes for many different reasons, and the central part spirituality played in these processes, helping us built from our own ashes the healing and community we so needed, mixing what we brought with us to the new things we found in the land and the people we met, and creating something new, yet so deeply born from our roots. To me, that is the very heart of being Latin-American.
What do you like about the short form?
ROSA: „The short film is an arrow straight to the heart.“ This phrase, scrawled on the walls of Cuba’s International Film School, the EICTV, by the great Cuban professor and screenwriter Eliseo Altunaga, perfectly encapsulates the power of the format: a swift and precise arrow that destabilizes, moves, and strikes its target with unerring accuracy.
Furthermore, the short film is a vital platform for expression among marginalized artists—dissident, trans, working-class, and Latin American voices. To champion the short film is to celebrate the cinematography of communities that break free from the bubble of Euro-American, white, and elitist cinema to craft truly contemporary narratives. From this perspective, short films continue to bring a freshness and relevance to discussions and formats that many feature films struggle to achieve, often recycling discourses we moved past years ago. The short film is, without question, a fundamental part of the living, breathing cinema we need today.
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PRESS REVIEWS
„The buzzing of cicadas. The crackling of a fire. Mysterious voices in the air. Telling the story of a Haitian migrant working as a researcher in the Cuban jungle who longs for home, Anba Dlo certainly creates an inviting and solemn aesthetic […]“
review by Redmond Bacon for Journey Into Cinema
„ANBA DLO ist auf der Suche nach seiner eigenen Erzählstimme, Emotionen und Identität fernab der Heimat immer wieder neu aushandelnd, – ein mäandernde, spirituelle Kurzfilm-Reise, in der die soghafte Bilder und Geräusche jede greifbare Handlungsstruktur überlagern.“
review by Paul Seidel for Riecks Filmkritiken
„Die Berlinale Shorts bleiben jedoch vor allem eins: vielfältig. In Kámen Osudu singt ein Stein auf Tschechisch über Selbstverwirklichung und Versagensängste, im Animationsfilm Futsu no seikatsu stehen die Wiederholungen des Alltags im Vordergrund, und in Anba dlo die Trauer um den Verlust eines geliebten Menschen.“
mention by Peter Bratenstein for zeitgeschichte online
„Nadia is a Haitian biologist who had to leave her culture, homeland and the people she loves most to dedicate herself to her research. She moved to Cuba, where she studies the local flora and fauna, so similar to those of her home country. Despite the similarities provided by the Caribbean context, the cultural differences between the two countries run deep, starting with language and religion.“
mention by Curation Hour
„“Anba dlo”, curta-metragem de drama produzido no Brasil, Cuba e Haiti, dirigido por Luiza Calagian e Rosa Caldeira. O filme narra a história de Nadia, uma bióloga haitiana que se muda para Cuba para aprofundar seus estudos, deixando para trás sua terra natal e cultura.“
mention by Márcia Bechara for CartaCapital
reactions on letterboxd
Berlinale Shorts 