World's oldest filmmaker dies at 106

A celebrated Portuguese movie director, Manoel de Oliveira, who is believed to be the world's oldest filmmaker, has died at the age of 106.

The city council of Porto, where Oliveira was born and lived, announced his death on Thursday, April 2, 2015 with little or no details.

According to THR, Portuguese Prime Minister, Pedro Passos Coelho said in a statement that Oliveira "was a central figure in the international projection of Portuguese cinema and, through films, of Portuguese culture and its vitality." President Anibal Cavaco Silva said in a televised address that "Portugal has lost one of the greatest figures of its contemporary culture."

Oliveira's final film, a short feature called , had its premiere in November in Porto, Portugal's second-largest city, and was shown at last year's Venice Film Festival.

Oliveira kicked off his career with a silent documentary about Porto in 1931. He made his first feature-length movie in 1942, but his work was sporadic until he was 76, when he began directing roughly one film a year.

Oliveira who was born on December 11, 1908, was also a Portuguese pole vault champion and a racing driver during his youthful days.

He is survived by his wife, Maria Isabel, four children and numerous grandchildren and great-grandchildren.