The Portuguese director João Canijo - who is one of the guest professors at the School of Arts - will have two films in competition at the next edition of the Berlin Film Festival (February 16-26, 2023). Mal Viver was even selected for the festival's Official Competition and will compete for the Golden Bear. Viver Mal will be in the parallel competitive Encounters section, dedicated to more experimental works.

With a filmography that began in the 1980s, Canijo is now, for the first time, in the main competition of one of the three major film festivals (besides Berlin: Cannes and Venice). Furthermore, the two films function as a diptych, mirroring different angles of the same dramatic situations: Mal Viver accompanies the owners of a hotel in decay; Viver Mal follows the guests of this hotel, in stories that freely adapt plays by August Strindberg.

João Canijo also reaches his creative maturity, in a film that explores - like his filmography - the tensions of families and their complicated self-demands.

The director has collaborated with the Escola das Artes for several years and is currently the tutor of the Final Project of the Bachelor in Cinema.