Blu-ray Review: Diamantino

STUDIO: Kino Lorber | DIRECTOR: Gabriel Abrantes and Daniel Schmidt | CAST: Carloto Cotta, Cleo Tavares, Anabela Moreira, Margarida Moreira
RELEASE DATE: Oct. 22, 2019 | PRICE: DVD $19.89, Blu-ray $22.99
SPECS: NR | 92 min. | Foreign language comedy fantasy drama | aspect | stereo | Portuguese with English subtitles

RATINGS (out of 5 dishes): Movie  | Audio  | Video  | Overall 

A cult classic waiting to be discovered, Diamantino is a totally screwy saga centering on a world-class soccer player with less-than-rocket science intelligence and…lesbian lovers, brainwashing, politics and the European Union, a pair of evil sisters, the plight of refugees, fluffy Pekingese dogs—and a whole lot more.

Directed by Portugal’s Gabriel Abrantes and American-born Daniel Schmidt, Diamantino won praise and international awards for its audacious style and genre-shifting style, and it’s a testament to the filmmakers’ abilities that they can keep an audience engaged and fascinated by a film that, on paper, seems like it would be a chore to sit through.

Portuguese soccer star Diamantino Matamouros (Carloto Cotta, Tabu) becomes the target of a secret government agency that wants to do experiments on him while he’s investigated by a lesbian secret agent (Cleo Tavares, Damned Summer) for money laundering. She poses as a teenage male refugee from Mozambique to get the goods on the sports hero, but finds herself harassed by Diamantino’s nasty siblings and her true identity threatened to be exposed by a jealous lover.

Critics have compared the film to the works of Pedro Almodovar (Broken Embraces) and Gregg Araki (Kaboom), and they are not far off. The odd, ever-changing sexual situations take surprising, often satiric turns, but pull back just before they get nasty. Cotto’s lead character is a sweet, well-meaning hunk-of-a-dolt, whose good nature shines throughout, whether he’s lamenting the loss of his father, imagining cuddly dogs helping him for inspiration in key soccer goals or getting involved as a parent–and other things—to his refugee pal.

In a different era, perhaps, Diamantino may have greeted enthusiastic audiences on the midnight movie circuit.  Whether positive reviews and a decent run in arthouses in major cities are enough to bolster interest in this truly unique production, it will likely take positive word-of-mouth to give it the attention it deserves. If that’s the case, let the word start here.