Eccentricities of a Blonde-Haired Girl

Eccentricities of a Blonde-Haired Girl is a wonder to behold. It was directed by 102 year old Manuel de Oliviera. He has been active since 1931, and his intentional gestures are especially apparent within Eccentricities. The film regards a young, Portuguese man who works for his uncle as an accountant. One day, peering outside his window, he sees a beautiful blonde. She is partly shrouded behind a veil, emerges with a chinese fan, and then returns into darkness. The way Oliviera handles this is with great care: he has no urgency, and this creates an anxiety. Like a first love, the accountant nervously attempts to approach the blonde. When he finally does, he finds that capturing her heart tastefully will be quite the chore, for he is poor. And here is the strength of the film: it's tender nature. For, as we see the young accountant act as a good man, and do good things, he can't seem to win. Oliviera creates a backdrop of cultural and religious metaphor, and yet the film seems to simple. We see a man who is afraid to lose something, and then is sorry that he ever lost it. Perhaps this is Oliviera musing at an old age on a 'girl who got away'. In the best scene of the movie, the couple are in a gambling room while the camera rests between that room and the adjacent one. In the adjacent room, which the camera briefly considers, a man gives a monologue on life. This monologue is so closely and eloquently intertwined with the events apropos to the accountant, that is heartbreaking to see him miss it, courting a girl in a gambling hall. Oliviera has crafted a great film, it seeps with melancholy, and yet it is endearing.
Eccentricities of a Blonde-Haired Girl: ★★★★