Exploring the Portuguese Memory through Appropriation Film: A toca do lobo (Mourão, 2015)

Abstract

This chapter reflects on the fragmentation of family memory, and on its relationship with national Portuguese memory from the perspective of filmmaker Catarina Mourão in her documentary A toca do lobo (2015). As a parameter for comparison, the author borrows Laura Mulvey’s notions of ‘palimpsest’ –understood as the inscription of a new text onto a previous one– ‘gleaning’ –the process of collecting, accumulating and recycling pre-existing materials– and ‘detournement’ –the act of inscribing a new meaning to existing material that supplants the original one– which are used to analyse the compilation film Un’ora sola ti vorrei (2002) by the Italian Alina Marazzi. Mulvey’s feminist perspective helps Cordero Hoyo to understand how the documentary is created by interweaving archive material with family history to discuss the political structures of a country, the circularity of memory and the passing of time.