Morrer Como um Homem is a movie by Portuguese film maker João Pedro Rodrigues, starring Fernando Santos, Alexander David and Gonçalo Ferreira De Almeida.

Plot:
Tonia (Fernando Santos) is the ageing star of a drag show in Lisbon. She has a young (drug-addicted) lover, Rosário (Alexander David) and a son, Zé Maria, (Chandra Malatitch) in trouble. She feels the pressure around her for completing a sex change, but – being very catholic – she isn’t sure whether she should really do it. To get away from it all, she goes on a road trip with Rosário.

There’s much that was done right in the movie, but also much that did go wrong. There were some nice, surreal moments, but also a lot of stereotypes. Tonia is a great character, but her son and the plot revolving around him was unnecessary and disturbed the rest of the film. In the end, the movie seemed to be trying to hard to really get it right.

I have to admit that I have difficulties to properly assess this film. I’m not really sure what Rodrigues was getting at and whether it’s actually important to know.

Much of what happened was stuff I’d seen before in movies, seemingly for the hundredth time. Why does the boyfriend always have to be a drug addict? Why is it always an ageing drag queen about to be disposed by a rival? And must there always be a troubled son?

That said, I did like the ending, the surreal moments (like when they go for a walk in the woods and suddenly everything is seen through a red filter, everybody stops and they listen to a song) and most of all Tonia and Maria Bakker (Gonçalo Ferreira De Almeida).

The performances were mostly good. Again Zé Maria, or better Chandra Malatitch, is the most notable exception.

And the soundtrack was really nice.

So, summarising, I think it’s a movie for a very narrow part of the audience-spectrum. But that part is going to like it a lot.