Arquivo

Adapted from the novel, La Princesse, by Madame de la Fayette, published in the seventeenth century, bringing the story up-to-date and into the twentieth century. Mademoiselle de Chartres suffers her first disillusion in love and agrees to marry Jacques de Clèves, a well-known doctor, although she does not love him. She meets singer Pedro Abrunhosa and her heart is soon, once again, rent with passion. Pressure from this forbidden love leads her, in her dilemma, to confide in her husband. He cannot stand the weight of this disclosure and dies some months later. Now, a widow, she is still prevented from openly assuming her love for Pedro and disappears, leaving no clue. Some years later, friends receive a letter from Africa: Madame de Clèves is living with missionaries assisting the wounded and homeless in a civil war. Manoel de Oliveira defines his film as "a passionate story, with fragments of social vision that show us the disorder that, with the same cruelty as in the past, assails our incorrigible world". Shown at the 23rd Mostra.