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Public Enemy #1

In 2016, a unique and unprecedented case occurred in the entire history of Cape Verde: a marine soldier massacred 8 comrades-in-arms and 3 more civilians in a military detachment. A feud and a poorly applied punishment were the source of the revenge confessed by the murderer in court. The tragedy called into question military recruitment, training, routine communication with the base, the operation of the Command and the Military Discipline Regulation, which had been in effect in the country's Armed Forces until then.

  • Mário V. Almeida
    Director
    Director
  • Mário V. Almeida
    Writer
  • Yuri Ceuninck
    Producer
  • Pedro Soulé
    Producer
  • Project Title (Original Language):
    Inimigo Público #1
  • Project Type:
    Documentary
  • Runtime:
    1 hour 10 minutes 34 seconds
  • Completion Date:
    February 3, 2020
  • Production Budget:
    3,000 USD
  • Country of Origin:
    Cape Verde
  • Country of Filming:
    Cape Verde
  • Language:
    Other
  • Shooting Format:
    DSRL
  • Aspect Ratio:
    16:9
  • Film Color:
    Color
  • First-time Filmmaker:
    No
  • Student Project:
    No
Director Biography - Mário V. Almeida

Cape Verdean, born in Bissau, Mário is a self-taught person par excellence. In love with cinema and literature, he always sough to express his vision of reality from his own personal experience, which makes his work unique and independent in the cinematographic context of his country.

He has done higher studies in Portugal and Spain in the area of audiovisual and documentary, However, he embarked on fiction short films, driven by his the deep passion for independent arthouse cinema. He wrote and directed “The Girl” (2012), ”7 ½” (2014), both shown at Festin, a Lisbon Cinema Festival (portugal). He won the prize for best international fiction short film in the International Film festival of Plateau (Cape Verde) and the prize for best national fiction short film at “Oiá” National Festival (Mindelo – Cape Verde).

Currently, he is returning to the documentary film with a documentar film entitled “Public Enemy # 1” that gives a cinematic treatment of the armed forces regime and the case of the Monte Txota massacre.
On its horizon he planes to do more fiction and documentary projects, as well short and feature films.

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Director Statement

The general theme of the documentary “Public Enemy # 1” is basically the military regime of the Armed Forces of Cape Verde and what compolled me to make this movie documentary is the massacre of Monte Txota, in which a soldier killed his companions and 3 more civilians in the military detachment of the largest telecommunications center in the country.

As no one could understand how such a massacre happened in the strongest and most cherished institution in the country, I decided to embrace the project, but with a higher level of commitment than I had been doing so far in my career as a filmmaker and researcher. I chose to contextualize the armed forces starting from the Constitution of the Republic of Cape Verde until reaching the simple military disciplinary regime that the officers put into practice, passing through the decrees that impose mandatory military service and the current military justice code. That is, I did everything from the military point of view and not from the psychological point of view of the criminal or from the point of view of the indignation of an astonished civil society, which would need a large budget to realize it completely.