O Fantasma (2000)

Young and handsome Sergio works the night shift as a trash collector in Lisbon, Portugal. He can't force himself to connect with his pretty female co-worker Fatima, who displays an avid ... See full summary »

Director:

João Pedro Rodrigues

Writers:

João Pedro Rodrigues, José Neves,

Stars:

Ricardo Meneses, Beatriz Torcato, Andre Barbosa

2 wins & 2 nominations.

Cast

Complete credited cast:
Ricardo Meneses	...	Sérgio
Beatriz Torcato	...	Fátima
Andre Barbosa	...	João (as André Barbosa)
Eurico Vieira	...	Virgilio
Jorge Almeida	...	Police 1
Salomão	...	Man with Doberman
Joaquim Oliveira	...	Mário
Florindo Lourenço	...	Matos
Rodrigo Garin	...	Young man in bathroom
Luis Zorro	...	Young man in Sergio's room (as Luís Zorro)
Maria Paola Porru	...	João's Mother
João Rui Guerra da Mata	...	Police 2 (as Guerra da Mata)
Lorde	...	Lorde
Swing	...	Doberman

Storyline

Young and handsome Sergio works the night shift as a trash collector in Lisbon, Portugal. He can't force himself to connect with his pretty female co-worker Fatima, who displays an avid interest in him, so instead Sergio roams the city with the trash company's pet dog. Eventually Sergio becomes fascinated with a sleek motorcycle, and then also its arrogant owner - a young man totally indifferent to Sergio. The frustrated trash collector's surfacing desires unleash his darkest impulses, sending him down a dangerous path of violence, depravity and degradation.

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Plot Keywords:

dog | garbage | motorcycle | portugal | night shift | 

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Taglines:

No one can live without love!

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Genres:

Drama

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Certificate:

Unrated

Details

Country:

Portugal

Language:

Portuguese

Release Date:

20 October 2000 (Portugal)

Also Known As:

Phantom

Box Office

Opening Weekend:

$10,434 (USA) (27 November 2002)

Gross:

$125,651 (USA) (7 November 2003)

Company Credits

Production Co:

Rosa Filmes, Radiotelevisão Portuguesa (RTP), Instituto do Cinema, Audiovisual e Multimédia (ICAM)

Technical Specs

Runtime:

87 min

Sound Mix:

Dolby

Color:

Color

Aspect Ratio:

1.66 : 1

User Reviews

The scavenger

What begins as a story of a homosexual young scavenger in the streets of Lisbon ends like an almost surreal wandering of a cartoon character amid images of litter and desolate sceneries. The sequences of the first half of the movie seem to show the young man's lonely course, obsessed by the love of men's bodies and motorbikes and feeling equally excited when he caresses any of them. His only friend is the dog which goes everywhere with him. This first half although made of a lot of fragmentary scenes some of them very crude and hard core, has some meaning by showing in acceptable realistic terms the young man's obsessive course. But in my opinion the final scenes twist that meaning and change something psychologically real and authentic into some rare pathologic anomaly of the mind which devalues the whole story a lot. The movie has however some value because of the convincing visual harshness of scenes in its first half, combining in a somewhat symbolic way the real garbage the scavengers have to collect with the filthy obsessions in the main character's mind in a series of simultaneously uncommon and sordid but real scenes.