migle1

A visit of God to Earth is used as pretext to take the viewer into a journey across northeastern and northern Brazil. Although the action is placed in Brazil, it could well be a journey across the world, the world outside the great cities of the northern hemisphere.

The film has the quality of being simultaneously profound and a pleasure to watch. It is very modern (or post-modern) in this attempt to target a wide audience but still taking that audience into feelings and thoughts quite outside the thoughts of everyday life; into the things people tend to forget or overlook. Like the films of Kusturica, it is the opposite of the prototypical "intellectual" film: it is not boring, this film appeals to everyone. It also doesn't attempt to conclude with a satisfying, but reducing, statement.

I disagree with the comment of Ernesto Lopes. Fagundes' portrait of God is not at all boring, it's more a portrait of a bored, and imperfect, distracted and Brazilian God. I would also consider very good the "irritating" performance of Wagner Moura and the performance of Paloma Duarte a bit more fragile; but, most of all, I think that the story is not broken up at all -- the cut doesn't focus the details of the pretext story, it does not invite the viewer to pay attention to details, instead, it merely takes the viewer into a simple sequence of scenarios.

I think this film is much more than just amusing. It is often that films intended for wide audiences start off with a very interesting proposal and, in the course of development, loose their sense completely by attempting to fit the standards of normality (take "Meet Joe Black", for instance). This film never looses its sense, the intelligent proposal of the beginning is never betrayed.

Taking into account the relevance of the argument, taking into account that even renowned directors like Polanski often have stories of little relevance, and taking into account that 10 is reserved for Bergman and Fellini; I would rate this film with a 9 if I were allowed.

What's wrong with the dubbing of this film? Fellini used the best studios at Cine Cita near Rome, the best in Europe. Why don't the movements of the character's lips match the words they say?

Fellini worked on the composition of his films while filming. Not always he knew what words to put in their mouth. Not before the film was cut and assembled. Often, he would just say to the actors to jabber (say one-two-three, blah-blah-blah, and so on). That's another reason which enabled him to just use people off the street sometimes as actors, choosing them by their face and not by their acting abilities. Perhaps it is also questionable whether this film should ever be subtitled, since the tone may be more important than meaning.

Apparently, the correspondence between movement of the lips and words was not crucial to him. If this is something which is crucial to you, then please DO NOT WATCH THIS FILM.

If you want to know Fellini, try to watch Amarcord or Ginger & Fred, or The Ship before this one. If you're intelligent, then move to Fellini 8 and 1/2. When you're no longer intelligent, then move to this film.

This is definitely not the movie to see if you seek a good 80-90 minute soft action or love film for entertainment. On the other hand, it will take only two and a half hours of your time to see some of the most striking and colorful imagery of the roman world of all times - of which, every director has difficulty in escaping.

The final minotaur scene, I understand, is not on the original Petronius novel (it couldn't be). It is the "Fellinian moment" of the film. All of Fellini's films end up in some sort of non-sense apotheosis which take your feeling of being lost to the highest point -- and signals you, at the moment you were thinking you were starting to grasp it, that there's a whole lot more than what you can comprehend.

Fellini once said that he loved decadence much more than sound-mindedness, since the former was so much more rich in its imagery and colors.