Projecto Global

The last two decades has seen a significant wave of films re-examining the revolutionary leftist terror groups that erupted across western democracies in the 1970s and 1980s, from the Baader Meinhof Gang to ETA, Carlos the Jackal to Jacques Mesrine. This theme even resurfaces in high-profile Hollywood features, most recently Paul Thomas Anderson’s One Battle After Another (2025). Shining a light on a lesser-known chapter in this tumultuous period, Projecto Global is a compelling fictionalised drama about the rise and fall of a real underground guerrilla group called FP-25 (Forças Populares 25 de Abril), who operated in Portugal between 1980 and 1986.

Writer-director Ivo M. Ferreira frames this loosely fact-based story as a freewheeling, kinetic, high-stakes crime thriller. His approach has an appealing grungy retro aesthetic and an immersive docu-drama rawness, but it also feels overlong, rambling and too opaquely explained at times. Following its world premiere in Rotterdam this week, Projecto Global should enjoy healthy festival interest, but its distended runtime and baggy narrative will likely limit its appeal to art-house audiences.

Despite Portugal’s shift to democracy following the Carnation Revolution of 1975, which ended half a century of right-wing dictatorship, FP-25 formed five years later due to mounting frustration over stalled socialist reforms, spiralling unemployment, economic recession, and other factors which they deemed to be early warning signs of an imminent return to fascism. Opposed to capitalism and the “bourgeois” parliamentary party system, they funded themselves with armed bank robberies, mounting small-scale attacks on military and commercial targets. They also killed 14 people, mostly businessmen, prison officials and alleged informers in their own ranks.

Taking its title from FP-25’s grandly ambitious political manifesto, Projecto Global paints a close-up insider portrait of the group’s operations, as embodied by a small cadre of long-haired, chain-smoking bohemians based in Lisbon. The closest thing to a lead protagonist is Rosa (Jani Zhao), a glamorous young mother with roots in fringe theatre. Together with Quieroz (Isac Graça), Jaime (José Pimentão), Balela (Joao Catarre) and others, her daily routine is a constant whirl of heated political discussions, clandestine criminal actions, and high-risk cat-and-mouse games with law enforcement. To complicate matters, a key member of the growing police operation against FP-25 is Rosa’s ex-lover Marlow (José Pimentão), who puts them both in peril by trying to warn her of the impending crackdown.

Citing the non-judgmental, gritty, morally complex cinema of the 1970s as his stylistic inspiration, Ferreira is careful to neither romanticise nor demonise FP-25. Instead he dramatises debates within their ranks about tactics and goals, ideological tensions and ethical reservations. If there is any editorial message here, it is that armed underground radicals have no legitimacy in a well-functioning democracy. As the world-weary detective (Ivo Canelas) pursuing the group says, “they should run for office, like all the other bastards.”

Swept along by a crackly, percussive, jazzy score, Projecto Global features some superbly staged action set-pieces, including a nail-biting prison break and a bank robbery that climaxes in a chaotic, catastrophic gun battle. Ferreira is less sure-footed in the low-key domestic scenes, which foreground lengthy, naturalistic conversation over narrative clarity. Back stories, psychological motivations, and connections between characters are thinly explained, blunting some of the story’s power as a smart political thriller. There is still much to enjoy here, but a sharper script and tighter edit might have made this fascinating based-on-reality story more accessible to viewers unfamiliar with Portugal’s post-revolutionary landscape.

Born after the Carnation Revolution, Ferreira was just a child during FP-25’s brief heyday, but he does have loose family connections with the group. In his Rotterdam press notes, he recalls an aunt being arrested and jailed for her involvement. Despite their crimes, most members caught in the police crackdown ultimately got off lightly with short sentences, pardons and amnesties under a series of sympathetic left-leaning governments. The director argues that their story still resonates today, the revolutionary struggles of the past helping to inform the current political landscape, including peaceful protest movements. “Projecto Global speaks of a dream of equality from which one is forced to awaken,” he claims, “and of the difficulty of accepting defeat when ideas collide with reality.”

Director: Ivo M. Ferreira
Screenwriters: Ivo M. Ferreira, Hélder Beja
Cast: Jani Zhao, Rodrigo Tomás, José Pimentão, Isac Graça Gonçalo Waddington, Ivo Canelas, Joao Catarre
Cinematography: Vasco Viana
Editing: Sandro Aguilar
Music: Nik Bohnenberger, Eva Aguilar
Production design: Nuno Mello
Producers: Luís Urbano, Sandro Aguilar, Donato Rotunno
Production companies: O Som E A Fúria (Portugal), Tarantula (Luxemburg)
World sales: The Match Factory
Venue: International Film Festival Rotterdam (Big Screen Competition)
In Portuguese
141 minutes