I Travel Because I Have to I Come Back Because I Love You

(Viajo porque preciso, volto porque te amo)
Karim Aïnouz, Marcelo Gomes | Documentary, Experimental, Romance, Fiction

2011 | 71 minutes | Brazil

In this award-winning and hauntingly melancholic film, geologist José Renato travels to Sertão, an isolated region in Northeastern Brazil, to assess possible routes for a canal. For many, the canal will be a source of hope, but for those living on its direct course it only means requisitions, departure, and loss.

Synopsis

In this award-winning and hauntingly melancholic film, geologist José Renato travels to Sertão, an isolated region in Northeastern Brazil, to assess possible routes for a canal. For many, the canal will be a source of hope, but for those living on its direct course it only means requisitions, departure, and loss. As the journey progresses through impressionistic landscapes, the desolation of the surroundings mirrors Renato’s own life, making the trip increasingly difficult. His geological research is slowly pervaded by a sensation of groundlessness, an incessant pining for his ex-wife, and a yearning to go home. Marcelo Gomez and Karim Aïnouz (Madame Sata) travel across the desolate landscape of modern-day Brazil’s interior. A genuine experiment in narrative and form, I Travel Because I Have To… features a mix of formats – Super 8, DV, still photographs – with the resulting feel of an intimate travel diary.

Reviews

"Beautifully structured and ultimately transcendent...a road movie in its purest form, offering an affecting record of processing loss and coming through to the other side. Gomes and Aïnouz work seamlessly together in the bleak Brazilian Northeast, creating a fictional travelogue for a character heard but never seen thanks to a creative combination of p.o.v. lensing and snapshots. Utterly unpretentious and deeply touching." — Jay Weissberg, Variety

"A genuine experiment in narrative and form, I Travel Because I Have To... features a mix of formats — Super 8, DV, still photographs — and the resulting feel of an intimate travel diary, although no home movie has ever been so beautiful, poetic, and filled with mythical resonances as this one. It's actually as if Karim Aïnouz and Marcelo Gomes had created a scrapbook of mental clippings about life in the uninhabited landscape of interior Brazil, harboring no political statements about poverty, but delivering instead some very intimate feelings." — Nando Salvá, BAFICI

"As singular as its title, I Travel Because I Have To, I Come Back Because I Love You embraces road movie, personal journal and trance-like study of arcing grief." — Jeannette Catsoulis, The New York Times

"Like the best trips, I Travel goes places that couldn't have been anticipated." — Mark Holcomb, The Village Voice

"The movie's true brilliance comes from its portrayal of how the world curls around you in the grip of heartache-every song on the radio, every face you see, every story you're told reflecting only what you've lost." — Alison Willmore, Time Out New York

"Spellbinding little movie deserves lots of attention." —Eric Monder, Film Journal International

"Karim Aïnouz and Marcelo Gomes blend documentary with fiction to forge a tactile, strikingly woozy first-person perspective." — Fernando F. Croce, Slant Magazine

"Boldly introspective but illuminating travelogue across a desolate landscape in modern-day Brazil by an existential outsider." — Louis Proyect, REC.ARTS.MOVIES.REVIEWS

Citation
Main credits

Santos, Irandhir (actor)
Gomes, Marcelo (film director)
Gomes, Marcelo (screenwriter)
Aïnouz, Karim (film director)
Aïnouz, Karim (screenwriter)
Capelato, Daniela (film producer)
Vieira, João (film producer)

Other credits

Cinematography, Heloísa Passos; editor, Karen Harley; music, Carlos Montenegro, Clãudio N, Pierre Leite, Mateusi.


Citation
Cataloging
Keywords
geology, canal, travel diary, road trip, super 8, DV, still photographs, travelogue, Brazil, spanish, spanish language, latin america, latin american cinema, latin american film, ibero america, latin, latinx, latino, latina,,anthropologically, cultural anthropology, forensic anthropology, anthropologist, human nature, physical anthropology, ethnocentric, ethnography, functionalism, cultures, societies, human people, human society, functionalism, globalization, ideology, pragmatism, dogmatism, social change, society,latin american studies, caribbean american studies, island studies, latin american culture, latin american history, latin american politics, caribbean american culture, caribbean american history, caribbean american politics, latin american languages, latin american and caribbean studies, hispanic american studies, hispanic people, hispanic culture, hispanic politics,culture, identity, identity politics, culture wars, left wing, right wing, intersectionality, identity groups, civilization, literacy, humanism, cancel culture, online culture, cultural revolution, cultural diffusion, culture shock, popular culture, pop culture, material culture, cultural capital, cultural assimilation ,cinema studies, film studies, cinema, film, movies, motion pictures, film history, film production, film criticism, cinema history, cinema production, cinema criticism, movie history, movie production, movie criticism, history of cinema, history of film,environment, environmental, environmentalism, climate, climate change, global warming, habitat, ecosystem, ecology, eco, earth, planet, water, sustainable, sustainability, deforestation, agriculture, green, green economy,economics, social class, money, capital, capitalism, class, economy, prejudice, intersectionality, inequality, poverty, income gap, wage gap, class warfare, elitism, snobbery, bourgeois, poverty, upper class, middle class, lower class, nouveau riche,south america, south american countries, countries in south america, argentina, bolivia, brazil, chile, colombia, ecuador, guyana, paraguay, peru, suriname, uruguay, venezuela, south american politics, south american culture, south american cuisine, south american education, south america in media, south american languages, south america history,geography, location, place, country, location, physical place, terrain, spatial awareness, territory, map, place, space, maps, cartography, countries, cities, mountains, territories, states, nations, borders, boundaries, topology, topography; "I Travel Because I Have to I Come Back Because I Love You"; Pragda Films
Clips
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Festivals

Venice Film Festival - Cinema Du Reel
Rio International Film Festival - Best Cinematography, Best Director
Havana Film Festival - FIPRESCI Award Best Sound
Cinélatino Rencontres de Toulouse - Grand Prix Coup de Cœur
Miami International Film Festival

DIRECTOR: Karim Aïnouz, Marcelo Gomes

NATIONALITY: Brazil

YEAR: 2011

GENRE: Documentary, Experimental, Romance, Fiction

LANGUAGE: Portuguese

COLOR / B&W: Color

GRADE LEVEL: College, Adults

SUBTITLE/CC: AVAILABLE

AUDIO DESCRIPTION: NOT AVAILABLE

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