Customer Reviews

Voyage to the Beginning of the World [VHS]

5 star:		(3)
4 star:		(1)
3 star:		(0)
2 star:		(2)
1 star:		(1)

 

 

To release a DVD containig a portuguese movie in the american market is, in fact, an act of courage. Manoel de Oliveira is, probably, the best potuguese filmmaker of all time and this movie is a fabulous example of what he can do. It's a personal voyage to the depths of the memory of a man and to the family past of another. Slow paced, very well directed and with a great script, "Voyage to the beggining of the world" is a typical portuguese movie, filled with a sense of nostalgy that defines the portuguese people. Indeed a great movie by a great director, the oldest in the world.

This exquisite movie is a swan song for Marcello Mastroianni, who plays director Manoel de Oliveira's alter ego in this film.
It is a voyage of introspection and self discovery that appeals to self reflexion and inner thoughts about the past, the present and the future.

This is another example of Manoel de Oliveira's brilliance. It's one of his most moving, deeply touching films. It's also the final film of Marcello Mastroianni. It's rather ironic, I think, that Marcello's final film would be in the hands of a Portuguese director, but life is completely unexpected at times. It would make better sense to say that Marcello's final film was with Fellini or Antonioni, but it wasn't. It was with another maestro of cinema, one just as good as the Italian masters and one with his own sense of cinema, style, and depth.

The film unfolds beautifully as a filmmaker named Manoel (played by Marcello) is driving around the Portuguese countryside reminiscing about his past while making a new film. It's easy to read that Marcello is playing de Oliveira himself, but this was far from Manoel's final film (he's made at least 10 films since this one, most of which are masterpieces). The film is beautifully paced, with excellent cinematography, great dialogue, and a deep understanding of art and what it's like to be human. Many people these days don't really "get" Manoel de Oliveira (both film goers and film critics), finding his films too slow, talky, and boring, but they're missing out on a master filmmaker. I think it's because we've become too snarky, smarmy, and cold, and we don't allow ourselves to feel anything when we see a film like this. We're too busy dissing something as languid and as artistic as this film, because we're too "hip" nowadays. Nonsense. De Oliveira, regardless of his age (he just turned 100, and is still active), is a true artist in every sense of the word, and I hope he continues for another 100 years.

Voyage to the beginning of the World is an interesting film to see nowadays Portugal, former conqueror of the seas and now a 3rd world country of the European Comunity, with all its social and cultural discrepancies ... It's interesting to note that Manoel de Oliveira was 90 year old when shot the film and that he is still active as a director, as film maker. Very beautiful and poetic movie.

I had great expectations for this movie, the first I had seen by Manoel de Oliveira. The theme spoke to me. I was planning to return to Portugal for a slow trip down memory lane myself, having left in 1964 to live in France and in the United States.

I found the trip the character Manoel takes down memory lane to be bumpy, crammed with unrelated digressions of little redeeming value. Because one of his companions (Afonso) has Portuguese roots but speaks only French, everything - and I do mean everything - the local people say has to be translated (and vice versa). Oliveira makes no concessions there, so you get a double dose of it all. Marcello Matroianni, as Manoel, is wonderful as usual. There are real nuggets of dialog and feeling in Manoel's reminiscing. That's all in French, no translation being necessary because no locals are involved.

Unfortunately, a good part of the movie isn't about Manoel's trip down memory lane but about Afonso's search for his roots. The main order of business is now between him and his Portuguese relatives. Jean Yves Gautier is competent enough as Afonso, but the Portuguese-French seesaw had me almost catatonic for the rest of the movie. To make matters worse, nuggets of the caliber found in Manoel's reminiscing are absent in Afonso's search.

Please note that I am a huge fan of slow, talky flicks. "My Night at Maud's" and most other Eric Rohmer movies get 5 stars from me. They have something to say and take their sweet time saying it. The French have a knack for movies like that, and keep finding surprising new ways of making them. American movies in that vein include Kasdan's "The Big Chill" or Linklater's "Before Sunrise" and "Before Sunset." I even went for Malle's "My Dinner with Andre" in a big way.

I have since watched a few other Oliveira movies, and I give them all the same rating as this one. The exception is "Party," which is so absurd that I recommend it be avoided at all costs.

Portuguese filmmaker Manoel de Oliveira was 89 years old with a resume that would let him make any damn film he wanted. So what did he do? He went autobiographical. A fine cast of four, headlined by Marcello Mastroianni, drive from France to Portugal in search of one man's past. Introspective and subdued in both style and scenery.

It can be difficult to read subtitles in a dialogue-heavy film. But once we reach Portugal, most lines are between a French speaker and a Portuguese speaker, with a translator, and the luxury (for me) of seeing the same thing in English subtitles twice. Even so, with an awareness that these films are a bit expensive in the US, I can't really recommend it.

So what is it about? Beginnings and endings. What we remember, what we forget. Family relationships gone bad. Atonement. Unflinching realism. In that, it is brilliant. But hell, it might bore somebody, I don't know. So I respect it but I don't recommend it. Does that make any sense?

I was very dissapointed, the Title of this movie, is very misleading, watching the center stripe from the rearviev window of a car is not my idea of Entertainment.