Eccentricities of a Blond Hair Girl (2009) NYT Critics' Pick

[lsanderson]

Catarina Wallenstein and Ricardo Trêpa, far right, in “Eccentricities of a Blond Hair Girl.”
Life, That Continuing Mystery, Should Be Lived, Not Worried Over
By STEPHEN HOLDEN
Published: August 5, 2010

In “Eccentricities of a Blond Hair Girl,” the Portuguese filmmaker Manoel de Oliveira’s exquisite but peculiar screen adaptation of a short story by Eça de Queiros, everything changes yet remains the same. All is illusion and beyond human understanding, and memory is not to be trusted in a film that takes a long view that encompasses generations. An excerpt from “The Keeper of Sheep,” a 1914 poem by the Portuguese writer Fernando Pessoa that is recited in the movie, distills the perspective of Mr. de Oliveira, who at the age of 101 should know something about farsightedness. More