CANCELLED; replaced with A Portuguese Farewell (1/5/88). "Rapturously received by Portuguese critics and filmmakers when first released, Vitor Gonçalves' debut feature marked him as perhaps the most promising talent of his generation. Isabel (Galhardo) returns to her father's house after a lazy summer vacation on the beach; adrift without any real direction in her life, she begins to muse on the possibility of a romantic attachment to Diogo (Doria), who directs radio scripts written by her father. Yet Diogo seems oblivious to her intentions; his affection for her is little more than an extension of what he feels for her father, and for a past which that father represents. Gonçalves creates a highly elliptical narrative, full of blind alleys and threatened confrontations which never arrive; this is perfectly matched by a visual style which masks the true shapes of space by creating illusions of depth which isn't there. An extraordinarily sensitive look at the end of youthful dreams, A Girl in Summer also has been read as a study of a new generation for whom the 1974 Revolution has become merely a part of history." -Richard Peña "Vitor Gonçalves' film impressed me in the very best way. From the start, I was taken by its simplicity and truthfulness, and with his sober and sensitive direction...the film is a look at life's 'shady' side, where the threat of disappointment looms large, yet because hopelessness is not proclaimed, one feels that the film beautifully expresses a kind of saudade, a very Portuguese feeling which neither tanks nor rocks can defeat." -Manoel de Oliveira