RECOLLECTIONS OF THE YELLOW HOUSE
Price: $395.00 Code: 2703 |
Directed by Joćo César Monteiro
1989, 122 minutes
In this iconic first appearance of his skeletal, tramp-like alter ego, Joćo César Monteiro directs himself as a penniless flāneur named Joćo de Deus who lives in a decaying Lisbon boarding house. He spends his days peeping on the landlady's clarinet-playing daughter, nursing his numerous physical ailments, haunting old cafes, whispering poetry, and listening to Franz Schubert. Tiptoeing around like a perverted Jacques Tati, Mr. Joćo's erotic fantasies begin to spiral and take a dangerous turn. After a shocking theft and assault, he is forced out on the street, where his madness ripens in a masquerade of disguises and multiple personalities. In a mental hospital where he's finally admitted, Joćo undergoes an unholy transfiguration as the vampire Nosferatu. Subtitled "A Portuguese Comedy" and deliberately evoking the popular spectacles of yore, Recollections of the Yellow House is both a sensuous and slow-burn circus act and a jewel of ingenious formal ideas and sublime lyricism. Considered by many to be Monteiro's crowning achievement, the film inaugurated an opulent series of late-period romps featuring the endearing and dastardly Joćo de Deus, the man you love to hate.