'City of God'

'City of God' (Cidade de Deus), directed by Fernando Meirelles 2002 (released in 2003), is a film based on a true story which takes place in the slums of Rio De Janeiro in the 60's, following two boys in the neighbourhood who take two very different paths in their lives. This violent story is told through the eyes of Rocket, a young fishermans son who dreams of becoming a professional photographer. His story narrates the violence and corruption surrounding the city, and the rise and fall of one of the city's most notorious boss', Li'l Ze. As war breaks out on the streets, Rocket's only way out of the bloodshed is to expose its atrocity to the world through his pictures, which are printed by mistake in the local newspaper. Along the way, others lives are put into perspective as their stories intersect with the events that take place.
At the beginning of the film, we see Shaggy get shot. The camera tracks him, so we are able to follow him as he's trying to escape. There is also a point of view shot in the flm, when someone is shot and the camera is shaking. This shows us it is a handheld camera, and that the character is struggling. There is a low angle shot of the victim looking up at their killer. There is a distorted close up of a childs face at the end of the film, this shows the audience the look of dispair on his face and makes them feel sympathy towards him. At the end of the film when Li'l Ze is finally caught, we see the scene through Rocket's camera lens, which allows the audience to see what he's seeing, makes them feel as if they were actually there. Then we see Li'l Ze's dead body through his camera lens too.
Near the start of the film, we see Shaggy sleep with a woman, and her husband comes in and catches the two of them in bed. As Shaggy escapes out of the window, the husband beats his wife with a shovel. This happens off-screen so we dont actually see it. However, we see him pick up the spade and begin striking something in the corner, where the woman is stood, and we hear her crying/screaming (diegetic sound) so we know its happening. After this, it cuts straight to another scene then cuts back too the husband standing in the room crying and digging a large hole in the floor. Although we're never told what really happened, we are able to work it out from the important bits we're shown.
In the 'drug base' apartment where Li'l Ze takes over, we're shown a flashback of how it came to be what it is. There is one particular scene in the apartment which is shown three times. It reminds us about whats already happened, but each time telling us more. When Rocket moves in with his female collegue, there are short scenes about two seconds long which show what they're doing. They cross cut meaning only the important bits are shown, it helps to speed up the narrative of the film, and shows the time passing that night. In the nightclub scene,the screen is split into two frames to show the audience what both of the characters are doing at the same time. This speeds up the narrative of the film aswell. There is a strobe light used in the club when Benny is leaving with Angelica to get away from the gangs. The strobe light creates a disorienting effect where we don’t know what’s going on, we see that guns are being shot but we don’t see who until the light stops. Other lighting used is natural light as most of the film is shot on location. There are some binary opposites in the film, e.g. good and bad.
All the characters are introduced individually throughout the film, their names are shown and then their story's are told. This allows the audience to understand more about them. Different scenes in the film have little subtitles to tell us what the next scene is about, for example, "Benny's Farewell", it indicates what might happen. The scene is about his leaving party, but he gets shot and dies. "Farewell" could mean goodbye because he's leaving, or goodbye because he's going to die. Towards the end, there is a slow motion recapping the shot boy's life story, he says he wants to kill his fathers murdrer, then does in the end. At the end of the film, it goes back tothe very beginning, where we see Li'l Ze and his gang on the streets chasing a chicken. Again, it shows the knife being sharpened, which suggests violence. Shortly after the scene is replayed, a huge gunfight breaks out.
I thought this film was very good. Like 'Leon', its not the type of movie I would usually watch, but I thought it was very interesting and quite an eyeopener. I did feel for a few of the characters, Rocket for example. Following his story made me feel more for him. The same with Benny, he was the only person that could calm Li'l Ze down, so he was a peace maker which is why I felt quite sad when he died. The only bad part of the film was the subtitles, youhave to watch them to undrstand whats going on, so you spend most of the film looking at them. Towards the end, though, I kind of adapted and was reading them without realising. The fact that this was based on real life definately made me feel more for the characters.