Studio: Southport Music Box Corpo Release Date: 01/17/2012 Run time: 257 minutes Rating: Nr

• Amazon Sales Rank: #8482 in DVD
• Released on: 2012-01-17
• Rating: Unrated
• Aspect ratio: 1.77:1
• Number of discs: 3
• Formats: Color, Subtitled, Widescreen
• Subtitled in: English
• Running time: 257 minutes

Review
Based on a 19th-century novel that's usually characterized as sprawling, Mysteries of Lisbon; is a hothouse melodrama seen through a cool, discerning eye. Director Rául Ruiz has called it one of his most theoretical films, but this multicourse (41/2 -hour) feast is no self-conscious demonstration of molecular gastronomy. The storytelling is straightforward, with a classical sheen, even as mischief and hallucination puncture the serene surface. The running time should not be cause for dismay; with 100-plus films to his credit, Ruiz is nothing if not a master of tone and pacing as he moves his players through the drawing rooms, hotels, convents and monasteries of Western Europe and, briefly, Brazil, unwrapping stories within stories within stories. --August 12, 2011 | By Sheri Linden, Special to the Los Angeles Times

About the Actor
ADRIANO LUZ (Padre Dinis & Sabino Cabra & Sebastião de Melo) Born in Porto, Portugual, Adriano Luz first devoted himself to the theatre as an actor but also as a director. In film, he has appeared in, amongst others, José Nascimento s Too Late (Tarde Demais) and João Mário Grilo s A Falha. MARIA JOÃO BASTOS - (Ângela de Lima) She was a woman to behold, but to love even more so. - The Count of Santa Barbara Between film and television, Maria João Bastos is one of Portugal s most admired actresses. She shot in Brazil under the direction of Ruy Guerra in In Evil Hour (O Veneno da Madrugada). She studied acting in New York. RICARDO PEREIRA - (Alberto de Magalhães & Come-Facas) A popular actor who enjoys phenomenal success, Pereira moves effortlessly from one genre to another. In film, he has already distinguished himself under the direction of filmmakers such as Mário Barroso in The Miracle According to Salomé (O Milagre Segundo Salomé) or José Fonseca e Costa in Viúva Rica, Solteira não Fica. AFONSO PIMENTEL - (Pedro da Silva - adult) Currently one of the most respected Portuguese actors of his generation, Pimentel was designated a Shooting Stars by the organisation European Film Production. On Portuguese screens, it is his performance in Frederico Serra and Tiago Guedes Coisa Ruim that earned him the widest acclaim. JOÃO LUIS ARRAIS -(Pedro da Silva - child) This Portuguese teenager began his career performing small parts for television. He exudes a strong presence in front of the camera and appears recurrently in the Portuguese telenovela Perfeito Coração. CLOTILDE HESME - (Elisa de Montfort) One of those fateful women who offer you in their first gaze of love, absolute bliss or utter unhappiness . D. Pedro da Silva Muse to both Christophe Honoré and Philippe Garrel, Clotilde Hesme is one of contemporary French cinema s most notable actresses (Regular Lovers, Love Songs, Angèle et Tony). With Mysteries of Lisbon, she excels this time around in front of Raúl Ruiz camera. LÉA SEYDOUX - (Blanche de Montfort) Revealed by Christophe Honoré in La Belle Personne, she has quickly imposed herself as of the most striking faces of new French cinema (Rebecca Zlotowski s Belle Epine). She has since followed one project of international scale with another. She has collaborated with Quentin Tarantino in Inglorious Basterds (2009), Ridley Scott in Robin Hood (2009), Woody Allen in Midnight in Paris (2011) and will next be seen in the fourth part of the Mission Impossible series, titled Mission Impossible: Ghost Protocol opposite a star-studded cast including Tom Cruise, Jeremy Renner, Simon Pegg, and Tom Wilkinson amongst others. MELVIL POUPAUD - (Ernesto Lacroze) Poupaud has been an actor in Ruiz films since his youngest age, beginning at 10 years old in City of Pirates. He then won recognition under the direction first of Eric Rohmer, then of François Ozon. MALIK ZIDI - (Visconde Armagnac) Discovered by François Ozon in Water Drops on Burning Rocks, Malik Zidi is now one of new French cinema s darlings. He works on a variety of film productions. SÃO JOSÉ CORREIA - (Anacleta dos Remédios) Bestowed with a strong personality, this actress is currently one of Portugal s most popular personalities. She has already performed in numerous series, but it is in film and theatre that her talent comes into full light. She has performed in O Cônsul de Bordéus by João Correia and Francisco Manso as well as in António-Pedro Vasconcelos Os Imortais.

About the Director
RAÚL RUIZ In 1983, Serge Toubiana wrote in Le cas Ruiz (The Case of Ruiz), his introductory text in the magazine Cahiers du Cinéma Nº 345, the Raúl Ruiz special edition: the most prolific filmmaker of our time, a man whose film credits are almost impossible to define given his diversity, splendor, and multiplicity with regard to production, for more than twenty years... Poignantly emerging onto the international scene at the end of the 1970s, Raúl Ruiz turned out to be one of the most exciting and innovative filmmakers in recent years, by presenting more intellectual entertainment through artistic experimentation than any other filmmaker since Jean-Luc Godard. Blazing his trail through his characteristic images and carefully honed sound, Ruiz is a guerrilla who, without compromise, assaults all preconceptions of cinematic art. This incredibly prolific figure has made over 100 films in the past 30 years, yet he has never adhered to any established filming style. He has worked in 35 mm, 16 mm and even video: making cinematic feature films, television programs for European distribution, as well as documentary films and works of fiction. Ruiz career began in the avant-garde theatrical movement, and between 1956 and 1962, he wrote more than 100 plays. In 1968, he completed his first film, Três Tristes Tigres (Three Sad Tigers), which immediately won him the Golden Leopard Award at the Locarno Film Festival. By supporting the government of Salvador Allende, Ruiz was forced to abandon Chile during the fascist coup of 1973. While living in exile in Paris, he was soon considered the enfant terrible of the Parisian scene. In 1983 the esteemed film magazine, Cahiers du Cinema dedicated an entire exclusive edition to him, an honor few filmmakers in the history of Global Cinema have received. The same issue praised him for his film The Hypothesis of the Stolen Painting (1979), calling it one of the world s top ten films of the 1970s, and praising Ruiz as one of the most important French filmmakers since Rohmer, Bresson and Godard. Working with innovative directors of photography such as Diego Bonancia, Sacha Vierny, Henri Alekan and Ricardo Aranovitch, he brought back a bit of the magic of the French realists poetry, by exploring the worlds of manipulation, of impotence and of violence. He explores lighting, using different filters and mirrors, and thus he recreates a filmic reality, in a kind of kaleidoscope, which introduces his audience into the labyrinth of his representations and which allows us to become familiar with his fantastic esotericism. Raúl Ruíz is considered a unique hybrid in the history of cinema, he is well known among active mainstream filmmakers as a defender of the cinema of ideas, in which he is the prototype of the artisan that creates images in movement. To Ruiz, cinema is an invention, it is an alchemy where the director unites all the elements he sees fit, and constructs them through the shots he creates, the images registered in that moment, from the concepts he reinvents. The aesthetics of any given project are inherent to the work itself, and it is achieved through good directing.

Most helpful customer reviews

9 of 10 people found the following review helpful.
The labyrinth of memory
By Robert Markham
Raul Ruiz's extraordinary MYSTERIES OF LISBON is almost certainly one of the greatest cinematic achievements of recent years, a sumptuous epic that marries old-fashioned story with decidedly contemporary storytelling. In bringing these melodramatic tales to life with such insightful visual direction (which pays homage to its forebears, films like CITIZEN KANE, THE LEOPARD and BARRY LYNDON), Ruiz unearths great depth of emotion and insight, exploring questions of sin, grace, and identity.

12 of 19 people found the following review helpful.
Putting together a puzzle, but missing some pieces
By Michael Harbour
A well made movie piecing together the linking puzzle pieces of various lives (mostly aristocratic) in 19th Century Europe. It's lovely, often dark (in mood, not in luminescence), well acted, with subtle dynamism to the cinematography. The unremarked-upon device of on screen observers watching the primary players through doorways and windows and listening from around corners is intriguing.

Unfortunately, it's too easy to lose track of the players and I was left with too many puzzle pieces missing. At four and a half hours a movie really needs to be more than the sum of its parts and "Mysteries of Lisbon", as good as the parts were, did not assemble those parts into a superior whole.