Biography

Sara Gouveia is an award winning filmmaker. Her films have strong visual aesthetics and explore the line between fiction and reality. Sara was an alumna of the Durban Film Mart, IDFA Summer School, Hot Docs Blue-Ice Lab and Berlinale Talents 2022.

Sara's first feature length documentary "The Sound of Masks" had its World Premiere at IDFA 2018 and was described in Africa is a Country as "a visual meditation on the nature of memory in postcolonial societies". The film was selected for the Marrakech International Film Festival 2018, Hot Docs 2019, New York African Film Festival 2019, the Durban International Film Festival and DocLisboa 2019, amongst others. The film received the award for Best Feature Documentary at the Plateau International Film Festival 2019 and the 14th SAFTA Golden Horn Award for Best Cinematography as well as SAFTA nominations for Best Feature Documentary and Best Editing in 2020. In 2021 the film received the awards for Best International Feature and Best Direction at the 7th Brasil Festival of International Cinema.

Sara directed the documentary "Mother to Mother", which premiered at the 2020 Encounters SA International Documentary Film Festival, where it was described as "an engaging and thought-provoking work of cinema that expands our collective humanity". The film was awarded second place in the Adiaha Award for best documentary film, it also received nominations for Best Documentary Feature, Best Cinematography and Best Sound during the 2021 SAFTAs and won the Writers Guild of South Africa Muse Award for Best Documentary Script 2020.

Her most recent short film "Like Water" has been officially selected for the 2021 Encounters South African International Documentary Festival, MUICA 2021 in Colombia, NYPSFF 2021 in the USA and Africa in Motion in Scotland.

She is currently in development with the feature film "Requiem of Ravels' Bolero", which was pitched at the Durban Film Mart 2021 and is the director of photography for the documentary "We, People of the Islands" set in Cape Verde.
- IMDb mini biography by: Sara CF de Gouveia