If the word for world is Earth, we call our world Soil. In the anthropogenic biome of southern Portugal, inhabited by humans since the Neolithic, the soil unfolds as a compost of layered time, gestures of care, magic, and acts of struggle — a tribute to bodies that have been planting, pruning, digging, occupying, healing, singing, working, and dying over these eroded lands.

Drawing on analog tools such as drawing, rotoscopy, eco-development of 16mm film, and other photosensitive technologies, the film overlays strata of audiovisual archives on land occupation during the Agrarian Reform (1974–76) with contemporary records of bio-social practices of regeneration, proposing a possible field for the imagination of futures. A spell-film, eco-developed with acorns from the cork oaks of the Alentejo montado.

Composting Cinema : Essays on the Soil

Ethnographic Film / Experimental | HD - 16mm | 25'55 | 2026

Direction: Daniela Rodrigues | Editing: Luísa Homem | With: Miguel Choni, Miguel dos Santos, Raquel Shakti, Workers from Marta Ribeiro's Charcoal Factory | Voice-over: Puçanga | 16mm Cinematography: Daniela Rodrigues | Eco-development with acorns: Ricardo Leite, Daniela Rodrigues | Camera Assistants: Inês Sapeta Dias, Ricardo Leite | Sound: Chris Muller, Aloys Kerrec | Sound Design and Mixing: Aloys Kerrec | Music: Puçanga, Coro Mor | Color Grading and Post-Production Support: Inês Sambas | Design: Dayana Lucas | Distribution: TERRATREME. A production by: FOGO POSTO