Pedro Pinho's fifth feature film, I Only Rest in the Storm, offers a sprawling, intelligent, and deeply human examination of postcolonial dynamics and white privilege in Guinea-Bissau. The three-hour drama, set for a UK release, follows a disaffected Portuguese NGO worker navigating a complex web of personal and political contradictions.
A Protagonist Adrift in a Postcolonial Storm
The film centres on Sérgio, played by Sérgio Coragem, an environmental engineer from Portugal working on a road construction project for a non-governmental organisation. From the outset, he is portrayed as an existential wanderer, first seen driving through a sand blizzard, seemingly attempting to avoid the weighty power dynamics surrounding him. His personal life, including his struggle with intimacy, mirrors a fundamental doubt about his role in Africa.
A pivotal moment comes when a Bissau-Guinean sex worker tells him, "What disgusts me the most are good men." This line cuts to the core of the film's exploration of western paternalism and the hypocrisy of well-intentioned intervention. Sérgio's non-committal nature is further reflected in his bisexuality and his dalliance with Gui, a lofty Brazilian drag queen portrayed by Jonathan Guilherme.
Navigating Shades of Grey in a Cacophonous Paradise
Sérgio's unaligned status, living between the expat enclave and the local streets without belonging to either, makes him a perfect conduit for the audience to witness the multifaceted postcolonial reality. The road project itself becomes a central metaphor: is it an economic boon or an environmental blight? This question is underscored by pervasive poverty, corruption, and violence, notably highlighted by the mysterious disappearance of Sérgio's predecessor.
Local businessman Horatio champions progress but refuses to discuss the disappearance, while market hustler Diara, played by Cleo Diára, runs a bar that serves as a racial and sexual utopia. It is Diara who bluntly reminds Sérgio that scruples are a luxury when he hesitates to accept a €150,000 bribe from Horatio. Pinho's script meticulously avoids easy answers, revelling in the numerous shades of grey that define the situation.
A Personal and Political Negotiation
While the film may lack the visual concision of directors like Claire Denis, it finds its strength in long, meandering, and ruminative conversational scenes. These exchanges create a warm, human texture, allowing characters and ideologies to breathe and clash. Through Sérgio, Pinho also implicates his own perspective as a white observer, negotiating the film's position on economic and racial questions right up to its bracing final sex scene.
The film continually fumbles toward its thesis, understanding that the personal is always political. For all its ambiguity and self-flagellation regarding white privilege, the movie is smart enough to recognise that such extended hand-wringing can itself be a form of that same privilege.
I Only Rest in the Storm will be showing at the Institute of Contemporary Arts (ICA) in London from 5 December. It stands as a compelling, thoughtful addition to cinematic probes of neocolonialism and identity.
