this movie is sad, full of ruin, but beautiful.
all the characters are touched by bad luck or misfortune, after all "mal" is the Portuguese word for "bad" but can also be translated as "evil".
things start like most of the Portuguese movies from the 80's/90's, that is kind of slow. of course there is also the usual English dialogue. then ruin strikes on the characters, and the story gets faster. at a moment things get really fast and the result is that the most dramatic scenes resulted kind of short! i don't know if there was a budget reason behind this but i'm sure the "in your face effect" wouldn't be as strong as it is in my point of view! just take a look on the pederast's suicide, or the bizarre ending! cheap but strong on emotions matter!
see this movie and you will be thinking of it for a while, trying to discover "meanings" for some of the characters, as ruin only strikes on one person after he/she gets in contact with one of the 2 youngsters on this movie: the adolescent junkie and the lost-on-the-street little girl. it reminds me the angel on Pasolini's "teorema". they are the bringers of ruin & misery.
alexandre pinto, here in his second movie, continues playing role of a street boy, dealing with heroin and stuff, like in "os mutantes" 1998 (another Portuguese movie that i advice!)
all the characters are touched by bad luck or misfortune, after all "mal" is the Portuguese word for "bad" but can also be translated as "evil".
things start like most of the Portuguese movies from the 80's/90's, that is kind of slow. of course there is also the usual English dialogue. then ruin strikes on the characters, and the story gets faster. at a moment things get really fast and the result is that the most dramatic scenes resulted kind of short! i don't know if there was a budget reason behind this but i'm sure the "in your face effect" wouldn't be as strong as it is in my point of view! just take a look on the pederast's suicide, or the bizarre ending! cheap but strong on emotions matter!
see this movie and you will be thinking of it for a while, trying to discover "meanings" for some of the characters, as ruin only strikes on one person after he/she gets in contact with one of the 2 youngsters on this movie: the adolescent junkie and the lost-on-the-street little girl. it reminds me the angel on Pasolini's "teorema". they are the bringers of ruin & misery.
alexandre pinto, here in his second movie, continues playing role of a street boy, dealing with heroin and stuff, like in "os mutantes" 1998 (another Portuguese movie that i advice!)
