André Moniz Vieira

Meet the award winning Portuguese film maker André Moniz Vieira.

andre_Andre_Moniz_Vieira_Profile_Pic

A brief biography:

André Moniz Vieira (born in Portugal, 1995) is a young experimental independent filmmaker and designer. Since a very young age, André explored obscure universes of esoteric and human mind nature. His directorial debut happened in mid-2013 with the 67 minute found-footage horror film: “Endless”, being the sole actor and production individual.

He founded his cinema studio in early 2017 and started the production of a documentary called “Razão de Viver” (Reason of Life) in which 9 people from various areas try to answer the question: “What is your reason to live?”. While producing it, André turned to experimental and more artistic cinema, perhaps in more “out-of-the-box” films, and began studying Alejandro Jodorowsky’s films such as “The Holy Mountain”, “Santa Sangre” as well as others like “Rabbits” and “Mulholland Drive” by David Lynch or even the more experimental “Lucifer Rising” and “Invocation of My Demon Brother” by Kenneth Anger.

andre_Popsec_s_Team_during_RazÃ£o_de_Viver_premiere — Popsec Team (Andre’s cinema studio), during “Razão de Viver” premiere

He then decided to focus on the concept of depression and suicide, which although he had never experienced its effects, has always been intrigued by the state of the human mind to come to such an end. “Melodies of a Mute Life” is an audio-visual journey carefully thought out and built around its strong images, compositions and its harmonious sound-mixing combined with the soundtrack of names like Rezso Seress, Alessandro Moreschi, Alias Conrad Coldwood and others.

“Melodies of a Mute Life”

On February 2019, the short choreographic film “HÚMUS”, won the Public Choice Award at Shortcutz Funchal. It is a very important achievement that an experimental non mainstream short, won people’s interest.

André is also a YouTuber. He is running his own channel with more than 3000 subscribers where his major focus is in his social commentary. You can watch his videos and subscribe here: https://www.youtube.com/skiloishere/ (videos in Portuguese)

“Movies have heart, have mind, have power, have ambition…”

– What is your personal philosophy?

– As “my master” (Jodorowsky) once said: “Movies have heart, have mind, have power, have ambition…”, when I read or say it out loud, what I can only think is that I’m the same as my films, I too have heart when I give every atom of myself to the process, I too have mind when I develop its message and its concept; I too have power when I make it happen and I too have ambition when I finally finish another art piece that not only it’s alive by itself, but it’s also a piece of me.

My mission is to break cultural barriers and to move people through his art.

– Any current personal or studio projects?

– We have just finished the editing of an experimental video clip in partnership with and equally experimental dance group called: “Húmus”, now we’re working on premiere it in Madeira Island, Portugal and send it to various film festivals all over Europe.

andre_Videoclip HUMUS screenshot — From the film “HUMUS”

As a collective, we are currently in post-production for “DADA”, a short-film about the Dadaist movement directed by me and my brother (Alex Vieira; also the writer). The objective of this film is to confuse people and at the same time convey the message that art is subjective. Everything about “DADA” will be dada in nature; from its presentation, poster and even the credit sequence; maybe it will be the first truly pure dada short-film.

“DADA” group out filming

We are also writing a big production (short-film) for the next year that will (for our first time) involve several actors, production crew and a crowdfunding campaign. It’s based on a horror/mystery tale that I wrote back in 2014 called “Incult” and we decided to give it a shot and adapt it. My brother is writing the screenplay and I’ll handle directing.

Apart from film making in the traditional sense, we have plans for a “film essay / free online indie film making school” channel for YouTube (all in English) of me and my brother’s perspective and comments on commercial and independent cinema as well as several film making techniques.

Personally, I’m focusing on developing my “traditional” artistic senses, I’m a digital artist in every way, from film making, photography, design and even illustration, but not in the traditional sense, and since I feel that I lack connection from the “first source” I’m currently experimenting with painting, analog photography, sculpting and maybe I’ll start shooting 8mm on my Chinon Super-8 Camera soon!

Major Influences:

Film making: Alejandro Jodorowsky; David Lynch; Wes Anderson & Kenneth Anger.

Art in general: Andy Warhol; Salvador Dali and Marcel Duchamp

Youtube and multimedia: Casey Neistat; Dan Mace and Jake Roper

Web Presence and Projects

Web presence links:

Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/filmbyandre/

Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/filmbyandre/

Website: https://www.andremonizvieira.com/

Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/skiloishere/ (Portuguese)

Popsec Studio Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/popsecstudio/

Popsec’s Vimeo: https://vimeo.com/popsecstudio