City of God

          

The movie is about a young teenage boy growing up in a slum near Rio de Janeiro in Brazil. The slum that the boy lives in is called “Cidade de Deus”, which translated from Portuguese is the city of god. The boy is named Rocket and is the narrator of the film and we are taken for a ride as he shows the conflicts that go on around him in the slum as he grows up. This movie is based on true events and is adapted from a novel of the same name as the movie. The movie is in Portuguese but is subtitled in English.

The movie is very unique in the way that it is cast. The director cast real street children and teenagers from Rio de Janeiro to star in the film. This adds some realism to the film that you don’t really see in other films. The only other film I can think of is an American film called Kids that also involves real city teenagers being cast in the movie with no acting experience.  The movies use of a narrator helps keep the audience member well aware of what is going on in the movie. This is important because the events are not told in order and bounce back between time periods from the 1960’s and 1970’s. The movie is primarily in the 1970’s.

 An aspect of the movie that may offend people is the use of violence. This movie is extremely graphic especially with violence. The violence in this movie is very graphic because it depicts a lot of children being killed by gunfire. It does add realism to the film but this may turn off some people.  It is a very surreal sight to see so many little kids and teenagers holding and shooting guns at people. The use of drugs in the movie is also very prominent. Drugs such as marijuana and cocaine are used by the characters and as well as a lot of alcohol. Since the movie is based on true events it’s hard to imagine this kind of stuff going on in the world but it is truly eye opening.  It could be seen as glorifying the gang culture because it shows how these poor kids become rich in their own right because of drugs but it also shows the downfalls.
 The cinematography of the film is beautiful. The director does a good job of showing the disgusting slums but also shows the beauty in the surrounding areas such as the beaches in Brazil. The story of Rocket’s life is very well told in the fact we feel the emotion he is going through. In one scene he loses the girl he likes to one of the Drug gang leaders in the film and you can feel the heart break he goes through knowing he can not do anything about it. If he would do something about it he would be killed.