SUGGESTIONS

MYSTERIES OF LISBON, Raul Ruiz’ masterful and breathtaking adaptation of the eponymous nineteenth-century Portuguese novel by Camilo Castelo Branco, scheduled to open in New York on Friday, August 5 followed by a national roll out.

Raul Ruiz’s masterful adaptation of the eponymous nineteenth-century Portuguese novel (by Camilo Castelo Branco) evokes the complex intertwined narratives of Victor Hugo and Charles Dickens. MYSTERIES OF LISBON plunges us into a whirlwind of adventures, coincidences, revelations, vengeance, betrayals and love affairs, wrapped in a rhapsodic voyage that takes us to Portugal, Spain, France, Italy, and as far as Brazil. Evoking the complex intertwined narratives of Charles Dickens, the film’s central character is Joao, the illegitimate child of an ill-fated romance between two members of the aristocracy who are forbidden to marry, and follows Joao’s quest to discover the truth of his parentage.
Nothing, and nobody, is first as it/she/he appears in this intoxicating spiral of stories within stories within stories, filmed by Ruiz with gorgeous period design, a fluid, pirouetting camera, and a stellar French and Portuguese cast including up and coming actresses Clotilde Hesmé and Lea Seydoux.

www.musicboxfilms.com/mysteries-of-lisbon