This is the first Leonel Vieira movie I see, so my expectations were based on what I knew of his previous work - which was that he directed two of the most famous recent mainstream movies in Portugal - A BOMBA and ZONA J. I also knew that this was the biggest portuguese production ever.
In fact, the production was very good and care was taken to make this an american standart-quality work. Also, for the first time, one gets to see convincing acting, which is something to praise on a portuguese movie. Ironically, the main character, which is one of the few portuguese actors, displays the worst and least convincing acting in the set. The distance from Diogo Morgado to the brazilian diva Maitê Proença (the woman to which he falls in love) is immense. This flaw, however, is well hidden in the nature of his character and on the reduced speech it has.
All in all, considering the huge difficulties surrounding the making of this motion picture (starting with it being filmed in Amazonia), I would say that it pretty much managed to pull itself together. Aside from the acting of Diogo Morgado and some minor storyline weaknesses (but then again, I haven't read the novel on which the movie was based), it has a well polished production quality and direction steadiness that surpasses by far most of what is made in Portugal. Too bad, though, that the cast is presented in spanish.
In fact, the production was very good and care was taken to make this an american standart-quality work. Also, for the first time, one gets to see convincing acting, which is something to praise on a portuguese movie. Ironically, the main character, which is one of the few portuguese actors, displays the worst and least convincing acting in the set. The distance from Diogo Morgado to the brazilian diva Maitê Proença (the woman to which he falls in love) is immense. This flaw, however, is well hidden in the nature of his character and on the reduced speech it has.
All in all, considering the huge difficulties surrounding the making of this motion picture (starting with it being filmed in Amazonia), I would say that it pretty much managed to pull itself together. Aside from the acting of Diogo Morgado and some minor storyline weaknesses (but then again, I haven't read the novel on which the movie was based), it has a well polished production quality and direction steadiness that surpasses by far most of what is made in Portugal. Too bad, though, that the cast is presented in spanish.