Oliveira next made a satirical film in the tradition of Luis Buñuel , '' The Cannibals '' ( '' Os Canibais '' ) in 1988 . The film is based on a short story by Álvaro Carvalhal and stars Luis Miguel Cintra , Leonor Silveira and Diogo Dória . José Régio first showed Oliveira the little known story , and Oliveira decided to make the film his only opera in collaboration with composer Joao Paes . The film also contains a demonic narrator Niccolo who appears and disappears from scenes magically . In the film , the beautiful young Margarida ( Silveira ) falls in love with the mysterious Viscount of Aveleda ( Cintra ) , while rejecting the advances of the notorious Don João ( Dória ) . On their wedding night , the Viscount reveals to Margarida that his great mystery is that he has no arms or legs and is " a living corpse " . Margarida throws herself out of their bedroom window in horror and the Viscount attempts to drink poison but rolls into the fireplace instead , singing an aria as he burns to death . Just then Don João enters intending to murder the Viscount in jealously and witnesses the Viscounts death . The next morning , Margarida 's father , brothers and family magistrate wake up and want to be served breakfast , but find an empty house . They look for the Viscount , but only discover a strange meat cooking in the fireplace , and conclude that it is a strange delicacy being prepared for them . The four men unknowingly eat the Viscount 's body for breakfast with great delight . Suddenly they hear a gunshot and rush to the garden where they find Margarida 's dead body and Don João sitting next to her with a self - inflicted gunshot wound in his chest . As Don João dies , he explains everything that has happened to the family and tells them they can find the Viscount in the fireplace . Horrified at their own cannibalism , the father and brother 's decide to commit suicide until the magistrate points out that they are now the sole heirs to the Viscount 's fortune . The father and brother 's decide to live , and turn into rabid dogs and eat the magistrate , who has turned into a pig . '' The Cannibals '' was screened in competition at the 1988 Cannes Film Festival and won the Critics Special award at the 1988 São Paulo International Film Festival
1988 Cannes Film Festival
1988 Cannes Film Festival
Manoel de Oliveira