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The Portuguese Nun review

A young actress has an epiphany in luscious Lisbon...

Reviews
By Tom Dawson published 25 January 2011

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Having recently split from her boyfriend, young actress Julie (Leonor Baldaque) travels to Lisbon to shoot an avant-garde period romance.

In her free time she meets an orphan boy (Francisco Mozos) and a real-life nun (Ana Moreira), prompting a moment of epiphany.

Director Eugène Green adopts a deliberately artificial approach to his leisurely plot, with self-referential touches and the cast stiffly delivering dialogue straight to camera.

Despite the distancing preciousness, there are compensations in the beautiful Lisbon vistas, fado music and unexpectedly moving resolution.

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