Mario Barroso Movies

This Portuguese-French comedy contrasts two men, Henrique (portrayed by the film's director, Joao Cesar Monteiro) and Jean de Dieu, appearing in a production of Strindberg's The Inferno. Offstage, Henrique is a seaman with an adventurous life, and de Dieu is the play's director. Onstage, Henrique plays God to de Dieu's Lucifer. Henrique is introduced by de Dieu to a writer who scripts scenes in which the two meet the mythical Ariane. Shown at the 1997 Toronto Film Festival, this idiosyncratic film serves up an eccentric entree of philosophical concepts with some comedic entremets. The "J.W." of the film's title is John Wayne, a reference to Henrique's fascination with Wayne's swagger. ~ Bhob Stewart, Rovi

This bizarre satiric comedy stars writer/director Joao Cesar Monteiro as Joao de Deus, who runs a small ice cream parlor in Portugal. Joao's employees are mostly teenage girls, and he rigorously drills them in proper procedures and encourages a careful regimen of personal hygiene. But the single and rather lonely Joao has an unusual hobby -- he collects women's pubic hair, saving favorite samples in a scrapbook and claiming to have a few stray hairs from Queen Victoria. Eventually, Joao becomes romantically involved with one of the girls working at his shop, but when that relationship goes south, he finds himself attempting to seduce the 14-year-old daughter of the local butcher, which lands him deep in hot water. A Comedia de Deus was successful enough to inspire a 1999 sequel, As Bodas de Deus. ~ Mark Deming, Rovi

In this artful film by 85-year old director Manoel de Oliveira, the heroine, instead of being powerless in the face of a world ruled by men, finds herself to be far too powerful. Beginning when she was a child, Ema (Leonor Silveira as an adult) had the kind of looks and manner that could stop cars when she came up to a street -- or cause accidents. As time goes by, she explores her power over men and, as a mature woman, chooses to marry a man who has virtually no machismo so that she can continue having affairs and exploring this mysterious ability of hers. Eventually she seeks to transcend her unusual limitation and accomplishes her death with astonishing serenity. This haunting story is based on a novel by Agustina Bessa-Luis. ~ Clarke Fountain, Rovi

In this experimental work, director Manoel de Oliveira puts in a few left-hand punches at the world of commercial cinema. The story opens with a stage play in which a costumed flapper (Bulle Ogier) is working her way through her scene when she is rudely interrupted by a young man. He proceeds to declaim his grievances to the camera crew that occupies the first rows, namely de Oliveira and his technicians. This sequence is then rewound and repeated in two different, speeded-up styles. Next, some images of global disasters fill the screen and it is on to the second major episode. In this segment, a disfigured Job (Luis Miguel Cintra, the disgruntled man of the first segment) proclaims his woes to his wife (Ogier again), woes that are easily interpreted as exactly those of the serious cineaste in a commercial world. ~ Eleanor Mannikka, Rovi

When an aristocratic young man of noble birth is compelled to look into one of his father's past romantic entanglements, he is led to a Pigalle nightclub where act after act is performed with the intent of splintering bourgeois sexual morés into humorous pieces. These entertainers, as well as an English-speaking woman and her daughter Clementine (named after the heroine in the American folk song?) are characters whose antics paint mainstream morals with a very broad and fuzzy brush. ~ Eleanor Mannikka, Rovi

Manoel de Oliveira wrote and directed this historical drama about the lives of some of his wife's ancestors who were active in the first half of the 19th century. In order to put across this slower-paced era before automobiles, planes, instant television and radio news, and computers, Oliveira uses a series of tableaus to emphasize the drama of each setting and the lifestyle of the protagonists. The feckless, wealthy Jose Augusto (Diogo Doria) and Fanny Owen (Teresa Meneses), a young English woman, are attracted to each other. A perennial love triangle is created when the author Camilo Castelo Branco (Mario Barroso) also falls in love with Fanny (Francisca), but is placed in a bind because he is a friend of Jose Augusto. In the end Fanny opts for the wealthy young man, and Camilo (who would eventually die by suicide) loses the love of his life. Now that the rich young man has succeeded in the chase, he has no interest in the result, and he and Fanny are married by proxy. Although she goes to live in his mansion, he does not stay with her and she is left alone -- and untouched. The triangle has come apart, and Fanny and Camilo have been separated, almost by the whim of the rich and disinterested Jose Augusto. ~ Eleanor Mannikka, Rovi

"Kilas" ("killers") is the nickname of a petty con-man in this standard detective story that starts out as a satire of American film noir. Kilas has a female companion known as Pepsi Rita who sings for their suppers, along with some hooking to increase the daily tally. The underside of life in Portugal is the backdrop for their eventual involvement with a deadly ring of spies. After the pair get entangled in the espionage web, the drama turns from satire to serious as it heads toward a sober ending. ~ Eleanor Mannikka, Rovi