It is nice to see a gangster film with a war between past partners full of betrayals in a decaying Rio de Janeiro. Actors perform well, particularly Milton Gonçalves and Nelson Xavier. The prostitute played by Odete Lara explored (both psychologically and economically) by the pimp played by Stepan Nercessian is very depressing, just as reality is in those situations. However, dialogues and art direction are too much kitsch, unconvincing, cheap... they did bother me. By the way, a queer gangster as the boss is interesting, but it is extremely loosely inpired by famous Madalena Satã, being not really comparable to Madalena Satã movie from 2002. Anyway, it is nonsense, as I have seen, to consider that this 1974 movie by Antônio Carlos de Fontoura is a better film or a better representation of Madalena Satã than the film directed by Karim Aïnouz and played by Lázaro Ramos in the leading role. In addition, I may mention that in Rainha Diaba there is a torture scene that I just do not know what to think about. Torturers had a lot of fun doing that, and the movie was made during brutal military dictatorship, that tortured with the very same methods. Indeed, I do not know if I consider it an unbearable lack of empathy to portray torture that way, or if I take it as a fierce critic as torturers were just the opposite of how regime repressive agents wanted to be seen. To resume, I summarize the film in one sentence: what if Almodovar and Tarantino made together a Pornochanchada?
Review of A Rainha Diaba
