A Cartomante

A Cartomante is based on the tale of the one of the most known Brazilian's writer, Machado de Assis. The story turns around Rita, Camilo and Vilela, who are the main characters. In the movie, Camilo (....) is Vilela's oldest and best friend. Vilela ( ...) is married with Rita, a beautiful blonde woman (Deborah Secco) . When Rita looks at Camilo, they fall in love for each other. Rita is very superstitious, so she believes in horoscope and cartomancy and rules her life based on that. Villela is also trying to become the main director of the hospital that he works. His competitor is Antônia Maria dos anjos, a psychologist who is having sessions with Camilo and Rita. The rest of the story is Camilo and Rita attempt to hide their secret love. This movie is very boring. The original three-pages-last century- tale is much better. This movie is good when you want something to make you sleep at night.

Camilo (Luigi Baricelli) is a single man, who chases beautiful women everywhere. He meets Karen Albuquerque (Giovanna Antonelli) in a night-club and goes with her to her apartment. There, she threatens him with a gun to use Ecstasy and have sex with her (what a problem, to be obliged to have sex with Giovanna Antonelli !). Camilo has an OD and is saved in the hospital by Dr. Augusto Vilela (Ilya São Paulo), an old friend of him. Dr. Vilela is an ambitious and successful doctor, who aims to be the next director of the hospital. He abuses of the use of pills and has a gorgeous fiancée, Rita (Deborah Secco). They intend to get married as soon as Vilela is promoted to director. Rita is a shallow and unsecured young woman, who believes in horoscope and cartomancy. Dra. Antônia Maria dos Anjos (Sílvia Pfeifer) is the psychiatric of the hospital where Dr. Vilela works, and has Camilo and Rita as patients. The lives of these characters will be connected in a story with a 'surprising' end. 'A Cartomante' is a very disappointing movie. The story is confused and deceptive, and the characters are emotionally unstable. The ambient sound is horrible, and although spoken in Portuguese and in a DVD with 5:1 system, I had to use the English subtitles twice along the movie to understand parts of two dialogs. The soundtrack is excellent. Deborah Secco and Mel Lisboa have better performances as the centerfold of Playboy magazine than in this movie. My vote is three.

Title (Brazil): 'A Cartomante' ('The Card-Reader')

A Cartomante is based on the tale of the one of the most known Brazilian's writer, Machado de Assis. The story turns around Rita, Camilo and Vilela, who are the main characters. In the movie, Camilo (....) is Vilela's oldest and best friend. Vilela ( ...) is married with Rita, a beautiful blonde woman (Deborah Secco) . When Rita looks at Camilo, they fall in love for each other. Rita is very superstitious, so she believes in horoscope and cartomancy and rules her life based on that. Villela is also trying to become the main director of the hospital that he works. His competitor is Antônia Maria dos anjos, a psychologist who is having sessions with Camilo and Rita. The rest of the story is Camilo and Rita attempt to hide their secret love. This movie is very boring. The original three-pages-last century- tale is much better. This movie is good when you want something to make you sleep at night.