| Overall Grade: |
A+ |
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| Story: |
A+ |
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| Acting: |
A |
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| Direction: |
A+ |
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| Visuals: |
A+ |
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Chillingly Real....Beautifully Made
by Adam S (movies profile)
Dec 12, 2007
43
of
47 people found this review helpful
I'm having a tough time thinking of a film I've seen that did a better job at telling it's story. From the opening shot to the last frame, it tells a fantastically powerful story split up into sections. The pacing is magnificant, as each section flows beautifully to the next one without missing a beat.
And the story? It's hard to beat, and it was TRUE! It's a story following several lives growing up through Brazil's "City of God", which is little more than a slum where all the poor and homeless were herded to keep them away from the more picture perfect Rio de Janeiro.
This is a survival story, yet it's completely different than any survival story I've ever seen. It's not a story of one person trying to overcome odds to improve themselves. It's a story of everybody in an awful situation trying to improve themselves through whatever means necessary. And that will only lead to trouble. And trouble ensues. A druglord named Lil Ze rises up through the neighborhood taking control of all areas accept for one run by a man named Carrot. Ze wants to get rid of Carrot, but refrains due to Carrot's friendship with Ze's right hand man Benny. Let's just say that Benny leaves the picture, and a full blown gang war ensues.
And that's just the second half of the movie. Everything after the sequence titled "Benny's Farewell Party" is unbelievable in every sense of the word. Unbelievably directed, acted, and unbelievably realistic. Your heart just BLEEDS for the innocent people involved in all of this, and deep down you know that these "horrible" gangsters are just living the only life they know how to live.
That was set up in the first half of the movie, starting in the 1960s. It shows how things were run in the ghetto, except without the control of Lil Ze, who at this time was known as Lil Dice. And he was just little. Maybe ten years old at most. He gives his brother and some older friends the idea to rob the patrons of a motel (which in reality is a complete whorehouse) and the results are...well...beyond words. I can't describe that scene without giving away a crucial turning point in the film.
All of the moments with "runts" (little kids) are gut wrenching. They want nothing more than to be the gangsters they see with money and power, and twenty years later it's the same way.
This is a fantastic film. I could very easily see it taking best adapted screenplay at the Oscars, and frankly I could see Fernando Meirelles sneaking under everybody's radar to grab Best Director.
This is good vs. evil to the nth degree. You get the sense that none of these people are truly bad people, they just...don't...know better. How can you fault them for living the only life they know? The only life they are ever given a chance to see?
One of the characters plans to leave this life and "live on a farm, have a family, and grow a lot of pot."
And let me just say, Benny's Farewell Party is among the best scenes I've had the pleasure to see on film.
10/10. See it if at all possible. |
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