Another charmingly eccentric exercise in meta-fiction from Portugal's offbeat new directing star Miguel Gomes, Tabu chooses to explore its characters without following narrative rules, or rather, by reshuffling hackneyed tropes from film and novels to turn them into strange, modern entertainment.
Tabu
✭ ✭ ✭ ✭ Read critic reviews
Portugal, Germany, Brazil · 2012
1h 50m
Director Miguel Gomes
Starring Teresa Madruga, Laura Soveral, Henrique Espírito Santo, Carloto Cotta
Genre Drama, Romance
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When Pilar's befriended neighbour Aurora dies, Pilar starts to dig into Aurora's past and learns about Aurora's very tragic love story.
What are people saying?
What are critics saying?
The New York Times by A.O. Scott
It is, of course, art rather than history - an elegant composition of dreams, memories and suggestive images - but its artfulness seems like an alibi, an excuse for keeping the ugliness of history out of the picture.
This blend of tongue-in-cheek exoticism and desire so strong it makes crocodiles melancholic amply rewards your patience.
Shot in beautiful black and white with some stunning visuals, Gomes' narrative quest is a understated gem.
The whole second half suggests a new way of storytelling-like one of those Wes Anderson montages done by an obsessive fan of Hatari! To judge from Tabu's first hour, pacing is not Gomes's strong suit, yet the filmmaker who emerges might win you over.
The Guardian by Peter Bradshaw
It's a gem: gentle, eccentric, possessed of a distinctive sort of innocence – and also charming and funny.
Like other great pastiche artists, Gomes has created a time machine to a cinematic era that never quite existed, so it feels simultaneously borrowed and new.
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