2019 | 105 minutes
João Maia
This entertaining and popular (it was one of the best attended films in Portugal upon its release) musical biopic explores the life and art of António Variações, a famous Portuguese pop-rock singer from the ‘80s who died from AIDS-related complications in 1984. The eccentric rock star is a queer icon few have heard of, but whose influence in Portuguese music lives on. Like his stage name Variações (or ‘variations’), he wove together his many different inspirations and in doing so revolutionized contemporary music in his homeland of Portugal. Maia’s film examines Antonio’s eccentric, turbulent personality as well as his artistic journey in creating his unique, genre-defying sound. Very much in the tradition of the recent musical biopics Bohemian Rhapsody and Rocketman, Guardian Angel is a dramatic portrait of an artist who transformed himself and popular music against considerable odds.