Odete

Joao Rodrigues' latest appears to have a bigger budget than "O Fantasma." The photography is better, the color is more eye-catching. And he certainly does know how to pick mouthwateringly sexy guys for his casts.

But just as he was mesmerized by garbage in "O Fantasma", he's morosely taken up in "Odete" by a wake and the necrophiliac attentions to a young man's embalmed corpse by the poor fellow's "crazy lady" neighbor and by his boyfriend, both of whom later become nauseatingly attached to the young man's gravesite.

The finale is reminiscent of the climax of "The Grifters" but that scene made sense. The last minutes of "Odete" are grotesque and poor in credibility.

Certainly, this movie is original and Rodrigues is a very talented auteur. But to succeed as art, a painful piece like "Odete" needs to be more than intensely depressing. Jim Smith