A Borgesian matryoshka doll of storytelling, Mysteries of Lisbon is Chilean maestro Raúl Ruiz’s magnum opus—a sumptuous period epic in six parts. Playing in its rarely screened extended version, this sweeping melodramatic saga is Dickensian in scope and magisterial in novelistic ambition.
Mysteries of Lisbon’s myriad flashbacks gain a new perspective, as Father Dinis moves to the center of Raúl Ruiz’s narrative labyrinth. Following his arrival in Episode 2, the series finds its villain in the cruel Alberto de Magalhaes, while young love beats an inexorable path toward tragedy.
All the world’s a stage for young Pedro, who underlines the theatricality of Raúl Ruiz’s lavish epic with the cutout figures in his puppet theater. Secrets beget revelations in this riveting second episode, as wicked whispers spread like wildfire through the drawing rooms of Portuguese society.
Mysteries of Lisbon moves to Revolutionary France, where Léa Seydoux joins the expansive cast as a young noblewoman at the center of an embittered love triangle. As more furtive personal histories are revealed, the narrative fog begins to dissipate, and Ruiz clears a path for the ultimate revenge.
Vendettas are executed, passions bloom and wane, and all roads lead back to Pedro in this diaphanous concluding episode of Raúl Ruiz’s elaborate masterwork. As its final secrets are revealed, Mysteries of Lisbon finds the ephemeral sum of a life in the stories we tell ourselves and each other.
