BIO
Lílis Soares is a Brazilian Director of Photography, winner of the World Cinema Dramatic Special Jury Award for Cinematography at SUNDANCE FILM FESTIVAL 2023 and first woman to win Best Cinematography at FESPACO, 2023.
She studied at the Institut International de l’Image et du Son in France, and Radio & TV at UFRJ.
She has worked in Digital media, TV and Cinema across Brazil, France, Russia, Switzerland, Angola, Benin and Republic of Congo.
She was the Director of Photography on the Nigerian black and white feature film “Mami Wata”, directed by C.J. Obasi, the Brazilian feature fictions “Um dia com Jerusa” and “Ó, paí, ó 2” directed by Viviane Ferreira, on “Nosso lar 2”, directed by Wagner de Assis, and on the feature documentary “Diálogos com Ruth de Souza” directed by Juliana Vicente. She was the main cinematographer on TV series “Amar é para os fortes” (Amazon), “Fim de comédia” and “Meninas do Benfica.” She also worked as camera operator on the feature film “Outono – um ano inesquecível” (Amazon), TV series “Sessão de Terapia” (Globoplay) and “Não foi minha culpa” (Disney). Lilis is also the winner of the 2020 Helena Ignez prize for her work in three movies including Mostra de Tiradentes.
BIO
She studied at the Institut International de l’Image et du Son in France, and Radio & TV at UFRJ. She has worked in Digital media, TV and Cinema across Brazil, France, Russia, Switzerland, Angola, Benin and Republic of Congo. She was the Director of Photography on the Nigerian black and white feature film “Mami Wata”, directed by C.J. Obasi, the Brazilian feature fictions “Um dia com Jerusa” and “Ó, paí, ó 2” directed by Viviane Ferreira, on “Nosso lar 2”, directed by Wagner de Assis, and on the feature documentary “Diálogos com Ruth de Souza” directed by Juliana Vicente. She was the main cinematographer on TV series “Amar é para os fortes” (Amazon), “Fim de comédia” and “Meninas do Benfica.” She also worked as camera operator on the feature film “Outono – um ano inesquecível” (Amazon), TV series “Sessão de Terapia” (Globoplay) and “Não foi minha culpa” (Disney). Lilis is also the winner of the 2020 Helena Ignez prize for her work in three movies including Mostra de Tiradentes.
AWARDS
SUNDANCE 2023 CITATION:
A World Cinema Dramatic Special Jury Award: Cinematography was presented to Lílis Soares for Mami Wata / Nigeria (Director and Screenwriter: C.J. “Fiery” Obasi, Producer: Oge Obasi)Jury citation: Through each frame, Lilis Soares’ expert lens mesmerized the jury. The richness of the black and white images, combined with the intricate and intimate camerawork of both the performances and natural landscape, elevated this folkloric tale to an intoxicating, visual experience. The World Cinema Dramatic Special Jury Award: Cinematography goes to Lílis Soares, Mami Wata.
Award Helena Ignez 2020 CITATION:
With two short films and a feature film at the Tiradentes 2020 show, the presence of a young photographer highlights a path of no return and the urgency of looking carefully at a cinema that goes through vital processes, of formation and political construction. The projects in which she participates receive the treatment of a rigorous research, on an old issue, but still little faced: after all, how to film black bodies? We find the strength of a perspective committed to the decolonization of making cinema, and we celebrate in his work the reception of an ethical issue unavoidable to our time. What she has done, articulated in collectives, such as the Collective of Photography Directors of Brazil, to which the jury extends its tribute, is a cinema that assumes for itself the responsibility of facing not only a dispute of narratives, but the agency of a black sensitivity. Because we know that the skin is our first lens, and for the ways in which it brings out new images, we reward a photographer in full activity, for the autonomy of a cinematic making that will cross the times.
FESPACO 2023
Best Cinematography Award, fiction feature film 28th edition of the Ouagadougou Pan-African Film and Television Festival (Fespaco), the largest film festival in Africa, based in Burkina-Faso.
PORTFOLIO
PRESS
‘Mami Wata’ Review: Cinematography Is the Star in Mesmerizing West African Folk Tale
Indiewire
Cinematographer Lílis Soares Captures the Details in Mami Wata
lenspire zeiss.
