'City of God'

City of God - Film Review

Cast: Alexandre Rodrigues, Leandro Frimino da Hora, Phellipe Haagensen, Deu Jorge, Matheus Nachtergaele, Douglas Silva
Director: Fernando Meirelles
Producers: Andrea Barata Ribeiro, Mauricio Andrade Ramos
Screenplay: Braulio Mantovani, based on the novel by Paulo Lins
Cinematography: Cesar Charlone
Music: Antonio Pinto, Ed Cortes
U.S. Distributor: Miramax Films
In Portuguese with subtitles

The irony calling this film City Of God is out the question for every visiting viewer. Seeing as it’s in the slums of Rio de Janeiro round places such as the haunted town for gang violence in favela - at the best of times, purgatory, and, at the worst of times, hell. God is nowhere to be found. Poverty is a way of life & with as much power you can have you’ll never succeed from it. Greed, drugs, violence all play on these streets of this Brazilian town & yet when the gang war erupts, prepubescent children arm themselves with guns and join the fray. In my opinion the ability to use a fire arm is more important to them as a trait then to be able to have the ability to read & write.

The violence of City of God is very extreme & quite shocking to say the least although there virtually isn’t any blood. Part of the reason is to do with the age of murderers & obviously the victims. Many gang members are children, it’s a horrible sight to see these children running around with AK-47’s as young as most people’s younger brothers. Death is no respecter of age in the slums of Rio de Janeiro, they kill with the same ruthless as an adult would. Their overall goal of a seven-year old homeless boy is not finding a family or a friend to get him out of these nasty ways but finding a gun.

The directorFernando Meirelles had an unique way of portraying this distinctive motion picture, one takes us into the streets with an unsurpassed intensity & immediacy. Meirelles’ style is a some sort of rip with many fast cuts, hand held camera sequences to give off that sort of roaming the streets reality feel to the equation & other instances of visual potency. 

If there’s a message that the film espouses, it’s that in a culture where violence begets violence, only the names change. When one gang lord is deposed, another will rise in his place. And, as often as not, it’s the children more than adults, who have to be watched.