É o Amor (2013)

Directed by: João Canijo
Country: Portugal

Movie Review: João Canijo’s new feature film focuses once again on very specific characters of the traditional Portugal. It comes after “Blood Of My Blood”, a tremendous success in Portugal and abroad, and consists in a sort of experimental documentary. The idea was to send the actress Anabela Moreira to live for several months with Sonia Nunes, a fisherman’s wife who has been working all her life in the fish trade in Caxinas, a Northern fishing town. The approach highlights the contrasts in the way that both women see and deal with love and life in general. While Sonia describes her past experiences, boasts about her child and solid relationship, and denotes a confident personality, Anabela seems more and more depressed after realize her incapability for love in the same way as Sonia, which led to identity issues to the point of calling into question her own professional career. Despite the curiosity that arouses, “É o Amor” was unable to convey stable levels of interest till the end, and the reason has to do with the repetition of its ideas. Canijo throws us long and repetitive close-ups of Anabela confessing her emotional state and admitting some kind of envy, invariable shots of women singing corny music inside a car, and detailed aspects about the everyday work and family life in Caxinas. In my eyes, not all the scenes were essential for this strange comparison between two worlds that nothing have to do with each other, and a good editing would have been fundamental to achieve better results.