Diamantino(2018)

2016moonlight

5/10

Spoilers

This review may contain spoilers. Bullet point review cus there’s too much nonsense in this film to even attempt at making a coherent text: - Huge shoutout to Carloto Cotta for building a career on the shoulders of his uncanny resemblance to Cristiano Ronaldo (Diamantino and the Netflix show Elite are arguably his two most famous roles and they’re both Cristiano spoofs that somehow simultaneously nail the absurdity of the footballer’s public image and completely misrepresent and mock who he is as a man). Would absolutely love for the two of them to meet one day, or god forbid, for Cotta to play Cristiano in an actually serious and non-offensive biopic where he could go further than the airhead façade. - Hated the characters of the sisters, they were excessively disgusting and abusive and their scenes made me uncomfortable. - THAT MANUELA MOURA GUEDES SCENE BELONGS IN A MUSEUM. SO. GOOD. my favorite bit in the movie. I cried laughing. - Hated what they did to the queer relationship between Lucia and Aisha. Highkey homophobic. - The political subplot was a bit cringe. I wish it had been less in your face, but still pretty self-aware. - The Portuguese hit show Por do Sol which has been the most unanimously loved portuguese television production since Morangos com Açucar or Aqui não há quem viva shares a lot of the same humor of Diamantino, just with better actors and a little bit more depth. But what is great about both is the Portuguese’s unmatched ability to make fun of themselves and to so completely and thoroughly understand the absurdity of our cultural landmarks (soaps, football, our crusader and colonial past, and the catholic church). I think we’re one of, if not the funniest people on Earth.