TABU
Portugal, 2012, 110 minutes, Black and white.
Teresa Madruga, Laura Soveral.
Directed by Miguel Gomes.
By the time that the affair portrayed in the second part of this film as highly criminal and sinful, extremely scandalous, the world had moved beyond this kind of condemnation and language, the 1950s and 1960s. This moral stance of the characters is portrayed highly melodramatically and lacks a fair amount of credibility.
But, the film starts in an entirely different way, making a point about white colonialism in a bizarrely symbolic story of a great white explorer and his train of carriers in Mozambique, haunted by the death of his wife and leaping into a river to confront a crocodile and, probably, fulfil his death wish.
The fact that this (and the whole film) is shot in black and white on a box-formatted screen like the olden days’ movies and that there is no dialogue only voiceover makes it look experimental movie-making while, at the same time, with the elevated (‘poetic’?) voiceover from the director himself, it seems quite pretentious.
Then the first part of the film, box-format but with dialogue is set in modern day Lisbon, portraying a kind middle-aged woman who becomes involved with a dying woman from the Mozambique white elite and her black friend. The kind lady tracks down an old man, an acquaintance (more than that we learn in the second part) of the dying woman.
In the second part, back we go to Mozambique and the story of the woman, her growing up, hunting skills, marriage and, particularly her affair with a dashing, pencil-moustached Italian. There is another plot element with the Italian’s friendship with a former seminarian who creates a band and tours in Africa, moving from the songs of the 1950s to the 1960s (‘Be My Baby’) and the Twist.
But…, still black and white, back to no heard dialogue (we just see the characters mouthing) and an increasingly ponderous and pretentious voiceover from the director, even to reading their correspondence. So, it’s like a silent film in some ways with the voiceover doing most of the narrative and the emoting, the characters merely illustrating what is being said – it could be visual radio.
At one stage, there is mention that the heroine was an adviser on an RKO flop (whose producer killed himself) with a title like ‘It doesn’t snow on Kilimanjaro anymore’. The unkind thought arose that the RKO film used this kind of plot and dialogue… With acknowledgement to the experiments with technique but the laden Lamguage of the voiceover was far too much for the general triteness of the plot and characters before our eyes.
1. An experimental film? A Portuguese film – with colonial overtones?
2. The experimental style? The use of the box format? The techniques of silent films? No dialogue in the prologue and the second part? Captions and voice-over? The second part as a normal drama in the present? The style of acting and performance, speaking the dialogue but the audience not hearing it? The touch of the histrionic and melodramatic?
3. The prologue, the great white hunter in the dark of Africa, his helmet and uniform? The men and their carrying the boxes of ribbons and goods? The hunter being haunted by the death of his wife? Facing the river, the crocodile, diving in to confront the crocodile, his death? Death wish?
4. The second part, the 21st century? Black and white portrait of Lisbon? Pilar and her conference and her charitable work, meeting the student at the station, her being unable to come? The meeting with Aurora? Aurora and her age, her being next door, no gratitude towards Pilar for her help? Aurora and her mistrust? Her savings, the casinos? The housekeeper from Cape Verde? Her concern about Aurora, devotion? Aurora’s daughter and her not going to see her mother? The lead for the Italian, going to the address, finding him in the old people’s home? His character, age, his commentary?
5. Part three, the return to Africa of the 50s and 60s? The focus on the white people? The blacks in the background? The music of the times, the bands, Bye Bye Baby, The Twist? The focus on Aurora, her background, her father, the way she was brought up, able to hunt, her studies? Her marriage? Her husband and his debonair look and style? His being away? The arrival of the Italian, the matinee idol look?
6. The Italian, his voice-over (voiced by the director), pretentious and ponderous, elevated Lamguage? His perspective on life? His boasting of his adventures, relationships with women? His encounter with Mario, the seminarian, leaving the seminary, coming to Africa, setting up the band? Their friendship? The Italian and his meeting with Aurora, their falling in love, the various rendezvous? Their attitude towards their behaviour – melodramatic, comments about sinfulness? The passing of time? Mario and his disapproval of the relationship? The attempts to break the relationship – the Italian going on tour with the band? The letters – all read out by the voice-over? Trying to break the relationship, Aurora and her love? His return, the reunion, Mario and his disapproval? Their going to the border, Mario’s arrival, the gun, Aurora shooting him? The arrival of the husband, the confrontation? Aurora as pregnant, giving birth to her daughter?
7. The comment about the RKO film that flopped, the tongue-in-cheek title of Not Snowing on Kilimanjaro? The triteness of the story, the performance? This film illustrating that kind of film?
8. Critical acclaim for the experimentation? But the actual blend of the ponderous and the trite?
