User:Ruiva

Bruno de Almeida (March 11, 1965). Bruno was born in Paris of Portuguese origins. He grew up in Lisbon and moved to New York City in 1985. He began as a musician in the downtown music scene collaborating with dancers and choreographers and in the late 80's moved on to make films. In 1990 he opened Arco Films.

In 1993 his film THE DEBT won the award for best short at the Cannes Film Festival Critic's Week. It played in 85 international film festivals and won 8 best film awards. It was released theatrically in Europe before features and broadcast in several countries.

His feature debut ON THE RUN starring Michael Imperioli, John Ventimiglia (from the Sopranos) won the award for best film at the Ourense Film Festival, in Spain, in 1999 and was nominated for a Critic's award at the Paris Film Festival and for an Open Palm at the Gotham Awards in New York in 2000. The film was released theatrically and broadcast in Europe and in the US. It had it's cable debut at The Independent Film Channel in 2001 and was released on DVD in 2002.

His second feature THE ART OF AMÁLIA, a documentary about the legendary singer Amália Rodrigues, was released theatrically and had a long run across the US in 2000. The film was broadcast in the US and Europe and was released on DVD in July 2004 by EMI. It went double platinum as the top-selling DVD in Portugal for four consecutive weeks. Bruno has directed 3 other films about AMÁLIA RODRIGUES, a five-hour television series, a concert video live in New York City and a tribute film at Lisbon's Expo'98.

His third feature O CANDIDATO VIEIRA a documentary about the satirical portuguese rock star Manuel João Vieira, who ran for presidential candidate in 2001, was released in the summer of 2005 on a double DVD along with a concert video of his band ENA PÁ 2000.

Bruno has also directed OTHER PROJECTS that include documentaries, commercials and music videos. From 1999 to 2004 he directed several projects for the Independent Film Channel including BEYOND BORDERS a documentary shot in Mexico about John Sayles and adoption in third world countries.

In 2005, Bruno created a film for LIVE EVIL-EVIL LIVE a dance piece by choreographer Francisco Camacho which premiered at the International Dance Festival in Algarve and was shown at Lisbon's Culturgest.

In December 2005, he completed his fourth feature THE COLLECTION a compilation of 24 short stories that were developed and created with a group of New York actors and writers over a four year period. This film is available for download at arcofilms.com and it was released on DVD in April 2006.

Bruno has two projects in production; VIEIRA II a new documentary on Manuel João Vieira and HOMEOSTÉTICA 6=0 a documentary about the legendary portuguese group of artists from the 1980's.

He recently finished THE LOVEBIRDS a feature starring Michael Imperioli, Drena De Niro, John Ventimiglia, Joaquim de Almeida, Ana Padrão, Nick Sandow, Rogério Samora, Dmitri Bogomolov, Fernando Lopes, Marcello Urgeghe, Johnny Frey, Filipe Vargas and Cleia Almeida.