How to Draw a Perfect Circle

Synopsis

How to Draw a Perfect Circle follows 17-year-old Francisco (Rafael Morais), a high-school student in suburban Portugal who feels trapped by his emotionally distant mother and the memory of his absent father. When his mother brings home a younger girl, Carlos, Francisco’s carefully constructed world begins to unravel. As he retreats into sketches and daydreams of a flawless circle, Francisco grapples with first love, sexual awakening and the pain of family secrets. With spare dialogue and a quietly observant camera, director Marco Martins paints a sensitive portrait of adolescence, exploring how one boy’s yearning for perfection mirrors his longing for emotional connection. Through lingering moments and introspective voice-over, the film reveals the universal struggle to draw the boundaries of identity and belonging.

Cast

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  Rafael Morais

  Guilherme

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  Beatriz Batarda

  Leonor

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  Gonçalo Waddington

  Carteiro

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  Daniel Duval

  Paul

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  Albano Jerónimo

  Jorge

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  Lourdes Norberto

  Clara

Reviews

IMDb gives How to Draw a Perfect Circle a 5.5/10 rating from user votes, reflecting a mixed audience response. Jay Weissberg of Variety wrote that the film is “an evocative coming-of-age drama buoyed by an arresting lead performance,” though he felt its pacing could be overly austere, noting that “the narrative sometimes drifts into inscrutable symbolism.” Cineuropa praised Rafael Morais for delivering “an astonishingly honest portrayal of teenage confusion,” and lauded the film’s visual precision, but observed that “its deliberate minimalism borders on emotional coolness.” The movie does not yet have a Tomatometer score on Rotten Tomatoes due to limited critical screenings, but audience reviews there average around 3.2/5, highlighting the film’s lyrical imagery and strong central performance while critiquing its slow burn approach. On Metacritic, no aggregate score is available, though individual online critics have commended Marco Martins’s assured direction and the way the film depicts ordinary family dysfunction with poetic restraint. Overall, critics agree that How to Draw a Perfect Circle offers a compelling if quietly paced study of youth, driven by Morais’s magnetic presence.