Lisbela e o Prisioneiro

Once again Guel Arraes and Jorge Furtado did it !

Lisbela e o Prisioneiro tells a story in the fifties of a young girl that loves american movies and a trevelling popular artist. Lisbela dreams with hollywood love stories and her story goes like this. Lisbela shows to the audience all movies clichés, but it doesn't mind, the audience loves clichés.

Smart dialogues, fast editing (more than 2200 cuts) and superb acting makes this film a real enjoyment for everyone.

Highly recommended

Leléu Antônio da Anunciação (Selton Mello) is a con man who travels through small Brazilian towns, scamming the people and sleeping with the townswomen.

When he makes the mistake of sleeping with the wife of a hit man's and is caught, Leléu barely gets away with his life. Quickly, he moves on to another town, Vitória de Santo Antão, where he meets and falls in love, for the first time, with Lisbela (Débora Falabella). The daughter of the Police Chief, Lisbela is a sweet girl who enjoys watching movies and usually relates life to the world of films.

Leléu has many problems to juggle: The hit-man, Frederic Evandro (Marco Nanini), also known as the Candlelighter, is hot on his trail to kill him; Frederic's wife, Inaura (Virginia Cavendish), claims to be in love with him and has followed him; and Lisbela is engaged to be married to someone else.

Some scenes are a little too much, too over the top, but overall Lisbela e o Prisioneiro (Lisbela and the Prisoner) is enjoyable.

The Brazilian film industry is growing fast, bringing to the audience outstanding stories and visuals. Lisbela e o Prisioneiro is an example of this growth. It is a hilarious "northeastern" comedy, with great performances from Selton Mello and Debora Falabella. The script also helped the actors in their performances, which is full of very funny lines. The director Guel Arraes did a superb job directing the cast and choosing his camera angles. The editing was also fast, adding a good pace to the whole movie. Another great choice was the soundtrack. It fits the story and the characters like a glove. It is definitively a must-see comedy.

Having seen other movies by Guel Arraes, I thought this felt a little too long. He has not used the great Selton Mello to his full potential, and therefore the movie suffers a little. It was a very funny movie, don't get me wrong, but it could be shorter, more to the point. The scenes from the old movies, IMO, instead of helping the storytelling ended up boring the audience. It is definitely worth watching, if for nothing else then for Selton Mello's acting.

Affective catharsis in every scene

The emotion, feeling, and affection that this film conveys is simply a masterpiece. Marco Nanini is simply phenomenal, in particular, but all the actors are fantastic. The script is incredible, gripping from beginning to end, and the metalanguage is delightful, in a comedy that leaves us enchanted with Brazilian cinema. Seeking our Brazilianness in Alagoas in contrast to Rio de Janeiro is also a powerful aesthetic of the film that turns the story into a myth that transcends our history and involves us once again in a temporal plot. Lisbela and the Prisoner is a recommended film in all its aspects, but mainly, it takes us to a catharsis of our bland and forgotten existence, remembered in each frame that affects us.