A Divina Comédia (1991) User Reviews

One of Oliveira's best

[dr-kandimba-1 · 6/10 · 5 November 2020]

Manoel de Oliveira started his career with the excellent "Aniki Bóbó", but then went on to do dozens of experimental movies that, for the most part, were failed efforts at a philosophical reflection. This is an exception. Here, Oliveira mixes quotes from Dostoyevsky, Nietzsche, the Bible and the Portuguese José Régio and puts them in the mouths of people that live in a psychiatric hospital. The result is a reflection on morality, religion and Europe, which is sometimes serious, sometimes provocative, and sometimes comedic. I have to admit that, not being familiar with the works cited, a lot of references were probably lost on me. But, then again, a script should be good enough to stand on its own and not require people to read thousands of pages of books to understand it. My first criticism is, therefore, the difficulty of understanding just exactly what is going on. Often, I found that there were some beautiful images and great lines, but that I couldn't figure out what the message was supposed to be. The acting is good enough to make this a good movie and far superior to the normal in Oliveira's movies. Miguel Guilherme is great as always, as is Maria de Medeiros, and it is delightful to see the master of comedy Manuel Viegas play the cynical philosopher (Nietzsche), a role that fits him perfectly. Maria João Pires, one of the world's best pianists, also makes an apparition here, mostly to play the piano, and holds her own very well. Some members of the cast are just so so, but none are bad, which is not usual in an Oliveira movie. Still, I have to point out the cast as a second source of criticism, as sometimes it stands in the way of the story (most notably, in the story of Adam and Eve). The movie comes very close to being excellent but comes short due to the failings I've mentioned. All in all, a movie recommended for those who like philosophical and/or experimental movies. Just don't ask me what the relationship of the story with Dante's "Divine Comedy" because I haven't a clue.

A divine comedy, indeed

[RResende · 9/10 · 19 August 2002]

This was my first contact, a few years ago, with the work of portuguese director Manoel de Oliveira, and I was completely astonished. The movie is given to a lot of interpretations, and the way I see it, it presents in it several extremes of the kind of people that in fact exists in our society. The story takes place in an insane institution, where all the "clients" believe they are an historical character. So we have a couple who believes to be Adam and Eve, we have another who sees himself as Jesus, another one wants to die so he can return to life as Lazarus did. But the characters whose dialogues I enjoyed the most where the prophet and the philosopher. This one is a none believer who is always discussing with the prophet on the theme of god. The prophet spends the movie carrying a book which he says has the truth in it, it's like the fith gospel. In the end (and I saw that as the true message of the movie), we find out that the book is totally empty. Just blanke pages. If the mankind history was almost always made by wars in the basis of books which had supposed truths in it, and those wars caused a lot of pain in lots of people troughout the times, than we should write no longer. The true gospel is in the good actions, not in a book with written

things that can be interpreted in many ways, even lethal ways... Think about it... and watch the movie to help you.