A Talking Picture is a 2003 Portuguese film written and directed by Manoel de Oliveira

Manoel de Oliveira

Manoel Cândido Pinto de Oliveira, GCSE is a Portuguese film director born in Cedofeita, Porto. He began working on films in the late 1920s, but did not receive international recognition until the early 1970s. Since the late 1980s he has been one of the most prolific working film directors and...

. It stars Catherine Deneuve

Catherine Deneuve

Catherine Deneuve is a French actress. She gained recognition for her portrayal of aloof and mysterious beauties in films such as Repulsion and Belle de jour . Deneuve was nominated for an Academy Award for Best Actress in 1993 for her performance in Indochine; she also won César Awards for that...

, John Malkovich

John Malkovich

John Gavin Malkovich is an American actor, producer, director and fashion designer with his label Technobohemian. Over the last 25 years of his career, Malkovich has appeared in more than 70 motion pictures. For his roles in Places in the Heart and In the Line of Fire, he received Academy Award...

, Irene Papas

Irene Papas

Irene Papas is a Greek actress and occasional singer, who has starred in over seventy films in a career spanning more than fifty years.-Life:...

, Stefania Sandrelli

Stefania Sandrelli

Stefania Sandrelli is an Italian actress, famous for her many roles in the commedia all'Italiana, starting from 1960s. She was 15 years old when she starred in Divorce, Italian Style, as Marcello Mastroianni's cousin, Angela.She was born in Viareggio, Tuscany. She had a long relationship with...

 and Leonor Silveira.

Plot

It is set in July 2001. Maria Joana and her mother, Rosa Maria (Leonor Silveira) go on a cruise from their home country of Portugal

Portugal

Portugal , officially the Portuguese Republic is a country situated in southwestern Europe on the Iberian Peninsula. Portugal is the westernmost country of Europe, and is bordered by the Atlantic Ocean to the West and South and by Spain to the North and East. The Atlantic archipelagos of the...

 to Bombay, India

India

India , officially the Republic of India , is a country in South Asia. It is the seventh-largest country by geographical area, the second-most populous country with over 1.2 billion people, and the most populous democracy in the world...

, to see Rosa's husband who is an airplane pilot. At each port, a new person boards the ship. Catherine Deneuve boards in France

France

The French Republic , The French Republic , The French Republic , (commonly known as France , is a unitary semi-presidential republic in Western Europe with several overseas territories and islands located on other continents and in the Indian, Pacific, and Atlantic oceans. Metropolitan France...

, Stefania Sandrelli in Italy

Italy

Italy , officially the Italian Republic languages]] under the European Charter for Regional or Minority Languages. In each of these, Italy's official name is as follows:;;;;;;;;), is a unitary parliamentary republic in South-Central Europe. To the north it borders France, Switzerland, Austria and...

, and Irene Papas in Athens

Athens

Athens , is the capital and largest city of Greece. Athens dominates the Attica region and is one of the world's oldest cities, as its recorded history spans around 3,400 years. Classical Athens was a powerful city-state...

. The captain of the ship (Malkovich) invites the three women to dinner at his table, and they all speak in their own languages for the better part of the conversation. Later in the movie, Maria Joana and Rosa Maria are also invited to dinner and the captain presents Maria Joana with a gift.

At dinner that night, the captain is informed that there are two time bombs aboard the ship. The passengers are then ordered to evacuate. Maria Joana runs back to her and her mother's cabin to get the gift the captain presented her with earlier that evening. Rosa Maria realizes that Maria Joana is missing, runs to the cabin to find her, and takes her back on deck to board a life raft. Unfortunately, it is too late; all the life rafts have left.

The captain sees them on deck and yells for them to jump. As he is struggling to take off his uniform so he can swim to rescue them, there is the sound of two explosions and a bright light lights up the captain's face. The credits are displayed with the face of the captain, lit up from the explosion, in the background.