O Crime do Padre Amaro

This film is a clear example of what makes contemporary Portuguese cinema absolutely disgusting. Moved by sentiments that are certainly anticlerical and atheistic, Carlos Coelho da Silva decided to bring to the cinema one of the most controversial and famous novels by Eça de Queirós, who was not sympathetic to the Catholic Church, but who gifted us with a writing of truly unparalleled beauty. Let me clarify this: the problem with this film is not to be against priests, but to completely distort Queirós work. It's a film without context, just a pretext for sizzling erotic scenes, worthy of a pornographic film, that turn a priest into a kind of "confessional sexual athlete". Why? Because sex sells. Just that.

The action of the film completely contradicts the book, so we can say that any similarity is almost coincidental. With the exception of the title and most of the characters, the film does not take advantage of the excellent material of Queirós, preferring to invent a new story in our time, where sex scenes fit better. The most reputable actors are there, but always in supporting roles (Nicolau Breyner, Ana Bustorff, Nuno Melo, José Wallenstein, Diogo Morgado, etc.), leaving the main characters for two weaker colleagues. Jorge Corrula has an angelic aspect in the cloth and Soraia Chaves may not have any talent but she looks great naked, and this was widely used in the film.

Needless to say, in an ignorant country like my dear Portugal, such a film was a huge blockbuster. Sex sells... sex involving priests sells even more. Did people read the book to compare, and did they also like good Queiros literature? I doubt that much. A pair of breasts are more appealing than a six-hundred-page book. A national shame.

This is not the best Portuguese movie ever made. And definitely not even a good movie. So what is all the fuss about? First, this was made for Portuguese audiences. It is a Portuguese story, the actors are known faces from television, the music can be heard in the radio. And with the help of a television network, a lot of publicity was made about it. Unfortunately, not for a good cause.

The story runs around the new priest in town, and how he falls into the temptations around him, becoming one of those he thought he would never be. But the adaptation of the 19th century novel does an effort to be "modern" and "cool", adding rap, street gangs, hungry news reporters and mafia-like businesses to the screenplay. And too much naked bodies.

And then unnecessary secondary stories take too much time from the primary action, so prepare for a really fast ending. Maybe that's good, you can go home earlier than you thought!!

Very cool! Finally a good Portuguese movie with "salt" and "rythm" in it! Very young adult film. Oh, and the priest is so "ugly".....or not!!!! Just remember this is a contemporaneous adaptation of a 19th century Portuguese romance. it's not just a script made for a "cool gangs-sex" movie... We may compare it to "Tentação" (1997) with Joaquim De Almeida, but it has an all new taste (visual and musical) to the movie, definitely a 21th century film. There's also a little bit of comedy involved, not "cheesy" but ironic. I would also say a strong language is involved in this movie, so strong that identifies with current issues of our society. My opinion... see it for yourself!!! It's worth it!!!

The film is nothing else than an exposition of nudity. Has anyone noticed that all three main female characters appear naked? It looks like the only winning bet for Portuguese filmmakers is to include some (if not a lot) of nudity of the local stars, together with slang which otherwise, in the nowadays Portuguese society, is repulsed with horror. If you watch advertising for Portuguese films at Portuguese TVs, they all have included a "hot" scene from the movie. I'm not saying, by any means, that Portuguese society is alienated; just that the movie industry does not seem capable of finding others ways of success. Going back to the movie... There is nothing left from the spirit of the book, which is a masterpiece. The film could have been a good one, had there been emphasized the real idea of the book (of actuality at any time) and not the strictly erotic part. It had almost all the ingredients... but the "chef" was awful...

I saw O Crime do Padre Amaro yesterday, and i all i can say is that the movie is very bad. Much of the characters of the movie are only there to fill up the story. There's no density and the characters change personalities without any explanation. It's true the movie is the biggest office box ever made in Portugal but, as someone already said, this is all because of the good publicity. The Portuguese movie industry has good movies, but this is not one of them. It is important that the Portuguese audience goes to see their own movies and maybe that is the only virtue of "O Crime do Padre Amaro". I've read that there will be a TV series made from this movie. I expect that the deleted scenes will explain better some parts of the story. The soundtrack is nice and representative of the music that is made in Portugal.