Diamantino - Il calciatore più forte del mondo

Diamantino's (Ronaldo's) twin sisters were so ugly, disgusting and over the top that I had to stop watching. Terrible overacting too.

Diamantino (given Portuguese name) is the best film I watched at EUFF 2019, a story that is relevant and funny it took me by surprise and made me regret I skipped it in 2018 at the MAMI MFF.

Narrating the story of a footballer who fell from glory to disgrace because of one missed goal, Diamantino takes you through government propaganda, fascism, illegal scientific studies, and a sweet little relationship between the eponymous character (the brilliant and talented Carloto Cotta whose face itself is so perfect for the role he plays) and a boy that he adopts when he learns about the refugee crisis. The humor is laugh-out-loud here, both through the dialogues and the visuals that is just magically delivered in a snappy screenplay of 90 minutes. The performances are the next highlight of the film, especially the sisters who played Diamantino's sisters on screen. Such beauty and sinister-ship they carry, you cannot take eyes off them when they are on the screen. But come to think of it, this is a film where you can't do it anyway because it's fun... absurdist, but just pure fun. The wit and wordplay is also very strong here. It will most importantly remind you of a real-life footballer who hails from the same country this film is set in... TN.

(Watched and reviewed at the 24th European Union Film Festival (EUFF India) in Mumbai.)

..you must be at least as stupid as the lead character of this movie.

Ok, it's comedy; ok, it's allegorical; ok, it's satyrical.

But still, it's all based on the dumbness of Diamantino, and everything is so in your face: no surprises, no plot twists, no emotions.

All characters are one-sided_ the good (and dumb), the bad, and the bad-soon-to-be-good,

The movie made me smile at the beginning, during the dreamy soccer scene, but that's all.

I actually did not fully undestand why the "daughter" had to be disguised as a "daughter", making it even less credible. Maybe in order to avoid any sexual harassment by DIamantino?

Anyway, this movie is avoidable. Best part: the last couple of minutes..

There are elements that showed promise: football and celebrity cult manipulation most of all (using a Cristiano Ronaldo-like clone; bad accent and family issues included). Especially if you happen to be Portuguese, but, of course, most viewers won't be. The production values are above average for what you'd expect, however the plot wanders, "serious" issues get lost, some of the acting is quite bad (a good turn from the protagonist and his evil twin sisters, though), and it is never as funny as it seems to think it is. In short: it's not great as a farce, and its not resolutely and wholeheartedly bad enough to be camp.

I tried to conjure up an absurd math equation which addressed the moving pieces that constitute Diamantino's 'plot' and gave up after "Comically evil twin sisters + Childlike megastar athlete ÷ (lesbian government spy couple - undercover refugee) = ..." The beauty of this is in not knowing what will happen next. Many movies can and actively do strive for unpredictability, but here is the rare reality of that achievement realized. It's cheap, in a way, just attempting that. I don't believe this film comes together in the end, but it has a lot of fun trying.

The central visual idea, which is plastered on the movie poster and might just be the only thing you know about this even if you don't totally about it, is that Diamantino (definitely not Ronaldo) is an internationally famous Portuguese soccer star who loves putting nutella on things and who, when 'in the zone', transports to a magical land of pink clouds and giant fluffy dogs. It's a visual metaphor for something that the viewer will likely either get immediately or scoff at. Thankfully, I found myself among the former.

The visual FX themselves are charming. Not just the green-screened pups bouncing (and eventually launching off into space) but the weird poorman's Minority Report tech setups and computer OS designs. Their feeling unreal added to the flow of this in such a nice, lowkey way.

I wouldn't necessarily say that the overtly political elements of the story bogged things down, but at times their prevalence made some of the general wackiness feel like shtick instead of an inspired genesis, and even more of a bizarre pairing when the film transforms into a full-on love story.

While it's far from perfect, I would definitely recommend this as something you need to see to believe, and the less said the better.