Hanami is a Japanese word that means “to contemplate the flowers,” and it is lent to Denise Fernandes’s film by a character: a Japanese volcanologist who explores the mysteries of the black sands of the island of Fogo, Cape Verde. Denise brings all of that poetic contemplation into her film – the search for beauty, the desire to remain when all the signs point toward paths that lead away.
Denise’s visual poetry is far removed from the style of Pedro Costa in Casa de Lava, which remains the island’s strongest visual reference in cinema. The lyricism of Hanami has its anchor firmly set in reality; it moves from the inside out and engages with the essence of the island’s inhabitants. For that, working with non-professional actors was fundamental.
With the exception of the Japanese actor Yuta Nakano and the French actress Alice da Luz, who play characters coming from outside, the entire cast was recruited on the island itself, after a long process that went far beyond traditional casting methods. In this way, a credible and admirable local identity was built, with particular emphasis on the strong and contained performance of newcomer Nha Nha Rodrigues.
Denise Fernandes has known how to make subtle use of the peculiar beauty of the island of Fogo, giving the impression that the landscape itself merges with the protagonists, shaping their actions. Visually, it is an extremely beautiful film, but one that follows a path distinct from Pedro Costa’s – the gaze here is always more inward.
A daughter of the diaspora, Denise Fernandes began by portraying, in short films, the Cape Verdean community in Portugal, with a social, political and, above all, cinematic eye, helping to fill a gap in representation in the arts in general. But she never hid her desire to go back to the point of departure to tell the beginning of the “story”: to film Cape Verde, those who leave, those who stay, those who return.
Hanami is a remarkable debut feature by a young director who has managed to define her gaze in a way that is both poetic and realistic, revealing another perspective that is as intimate as it is universal.
Hanami by Denise Fernandes, featuring Nha Nha Rodrigues, Alice da Luz, Yuta Nakano and João Galinha Mendes, 96 min