FIRST RESPONSE 

Score: 10/10 

I really loved City Of God. It had the feel of an early Tarantino movie but done far better than he ever could. The non-linear narrative serves to get you hooked in the beginning, and throughout the film works to make the viewer know the world built by the film intimately. The character writing is also phenomenal, from the simple observing mindset of Rocket to the many flaws and insecurities of Lil’ Ze. It serves to portray a gangster lifestyle without romanticizing it like its western counterparts would. The film also looks fantastic. All round this movie is great.  

MEMORABLE SCENE: BENNY’S GOODBYE PARTY 

In a movie mostly consisting of non-stop violence and gang talk, Benny’s farewell party serves as a brief respite from the nihilism and misfortune the film frequently portrays. It’s the first scene in a while where everyone is having a good time: From the wide shots of the crowd, it really portrays Benny’s popularity and how he was uplifting the community. This is also the first scene where the audience is shown characters from other groups in the favela’s other than the gangs, expanding the audience’s view of the setting as well as showing them that the gangs are only one small part of life in the slums. The scene is also the beginning of the film’s portrayal of Lil’ Ze’s many flaws. Up until this point in the film, Lil’ Ze has been presented as primarily a figure of fear and power. He kills with no remorse, takes over businesses and runs the slums like a dictator. The whole movie seems to be telling the audience that Lil’ Ze is an entirely fearsome individual. But this party, as it is a break from the action of the rest of the film, takes Lil’ Ze out of the context of gangs and violence, instead into a peaceful gathering, and he is immediately seen as weaker by the audience. Lil’ Ze, who before had been fearsome and commanding, is shown standing awkwardly and alone, and failing all types of social interaction. The camera shows this as well, as the scenes with Benny interacting with the party goers shows them all in focus, while Lil’ Ze primarily gets closeups with the rest of the party out of focus in the backgroud. This is the first time we see Lil’ Ze outside the context of power and he is immediately revealed to be a pathetic person. The only way he finds enjoyment in the party is belittling somebody else to regain a sense of power in the party. The audience stops giving him any respect, as he fails to operate like a normal person when not ordering people around. 

THE MICRO ELEMENTS 

Mise-en-scene: 

• When the apartment is owned by Dona Zelia, the apartment is warmly lit, well furnished and in good condition, showing that the person who owned it used it primarily as a living space. 

• After Big Boy took over the lighting became more naturalistic and the apartment looked less well looked after. A lot of the stylish furnishings like the blinds and tablecloths are also gone, and drugs are on the table, showing that the focus is primarily on drug dealing now 

• When Aristotle is introduced, the table is moved to the side and a clearer view is given to the sofas, in order to portray a focus on their relationship for the following segment. The lighting is also all artificial, indicating night.  

• The space grows darker and darker as Aristotle’s segment goes on, with less lights in the apartment on, ending with Aristotle’s death in a mostly black space.  

Editing 

Read the following by the film’s editor: 

Daniel Rezende said, “What we tried to do with the editing was attempt to use ‘effects’ whenever we thought that this could bring something extra to the sensation or emotion that we were aiming to evoke. If the situation is tense, and there’s no time to think, we speed it up and make it even tenser. If the 

character is going to be important later, then we freeze the face to commit it to memory. If both things happen at the same time, then we split the screen, so as not to lose anything. In the third part of the film, we especially welcomed anything out of the ordinary for the editing style. If a ‘badly made’ cut could increase levels of discomfort in the viewer then we incorporated it.” 

3 edits: 

• Showing Lil’ Dice’s rise to power, after Lil’ Dice shoots Goose we transition to a montage of Lil’ Dice shooting people, all in the same low angle as Goose’s execution, with sporadic zoom ins. 

• The film starts with cuts to and from a black screen and a knife being sharpened 

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Cinematography 

The Opening (Credit sequence – to the football match) – watch in class (tryout the sound to focus on the camera moves – HIGHLIGHT the correct terminology) 

• The ‘restless’ style, characteristic of the film, announces itself from the start. It begins not with the customary establishing shot but with flashes that illuminate a series of close ups – knife, hand, and stone – with a cut to black between each shot. Another photographic flash illuminates Rocket with his camera. He zooms out from behind a network of bars, which collapses down into his image. This is in fact a flash forward to the scene that will replay very near the end of the film, where we will see then that the reverse shot has denied us here, with Zé bribing the police after his gun battle with Ned and subsequent arrest. He has been introduced as a key player in the drama, but still only a fragment. The montage of conflicting shots and the collision of the fast-paced editing now gives way to the spectacular circling shots which will morph Rocket from a young man to a boy, and the favela to its former days of low-rise shacks and open spaces. The meeting between two of the principle characters initiates the story; the circular shot will provide the bridge between what they were and what they will become. 

• The series of tight close ups zooms in and out on further fragments of street life – faces, a guitar, a tambourine, hands with tumblers of drinks, hands scraping and chopping carrots, chicken feet and chickens being lowered into the cooking pot. The first mid shot of the film is of a live chicken on the table, tethered by its leg. A cut provides the first long establishing shot of the film. The chicken jumps down off the table making a bid for freedom. Brazilians describe a situation that appears to have taken off and be going but will soon crash to the ground as a “flying chicken”. This apparent freedom is illusionary – the chicken might try to fly but it can’t get very far. A close-up low-level shot from the chicken’s point of view shows a plate of blood on the ground, a reminder of the chicken’s fate. 

HOTEL ROBBERY 

• Fast cuts between members of the Tender Trio 

• Montage-like sequence 

• String music playing (non-diegetic) 

• No loud noises 

• Minimal violence 

• No focus on the people, just the Tender Trio 

• One segment where it pans down from the mirror on the ceiling is pretty cool 

• Mostly midshots 

• Camera follows the Tender Trio as they move 

• Close up on screaming woman 

• Music cuts immediately after window breaks 

THE STORY OF LIL’ DICE 

• No non-diegetic sound (no music) 

• Slow 

• Loud crying, shouting  

• Gunshots stand out against the quiet 

• Dim lighting 

• Quite a bit of violence 

• Less action, just killing 

• Violence continues from hotel to the streets 

• Victims blurred when he entered the room – shows dissociation? 

• Music comes in during the montage of Lil’ Dice’s rise to power – gangster-style jazz-like music 

BOOK ORIGIN 

• Lins was doing research for a study on drug dealers and was told by his boss to make a book out of it 

• The book was published in 1997 and was written over the period of 8 years 

• The book is semi-autobiographical: Lins was raised in the City Of God, and the book is based on the experiences of him and his friend Rocket 

• Meirelles was given the book by a friend and was told to shoot the film. He loved the book and decided to make the film 

• The book shocked the population as it revealed the brutal reality of the favelas 

HOW DID MEIRELLES AND LUND GET INVOLVED? 

• Lund was finishing a documentary on drug dealers, and Meirelles thought this knowledge would be useful to have on set 

• Initially, Lund was only meant to create a workshop for the actors, but they worked so well together she was invited onto the project 

• Lund was primarily focused on the acting, while Meirelles took the other roles 

CASTING AND FILMING 

• Meirelles wanted to use non actors so he could closer capture the feeling of the book 

• The “actors” were pulled from the real-life favelas of Brazil, some even coming from the titular City Of God 

• The only professional actor on set was Matheus Nachtergaele, who played Carrot 

• The actors were not given a script: They were given the intentions behind the scenes and improvised. This helped with Meirelles’ aim to capture the reality of the book 

BOX OFFICE/FUNDING 

• Meirelles was meant to receive funding from American company Miramax, but the money didn’t come through 

• Meirelles was forced to fund the whole movie himself 

• Miramax later worked on international distribution of the film 

• In Brazil, the film sold over 3.1 million tickets and grossed $10.3 million. 

• In the US, it grossed over $7.3 million and internationally grossed $30.5 million 

CRITICAL REACTION 

• The film was a critical success 

• It received a lot of praise from film critics for its plot and filmmaking 

• There were many negative criticisms, such as people believing it was glamourizing the favelas and poverty, which Meirelles stated was not his intention and something he hoped he’d avoided 

• There were also worries that it will stigmatize the children of the favela of the City Of God 

• President Lula of Brazil told Meirelles that the film had a big impact on him, and it influenced his changes to laws on public security 

TECHNOLOGICAL 

• “Digital editing allowed the characters to be shaped in the edit” 

• A lot of improvisation was filmed and the use of digital editing allowed them to try a lot of different takes and lines of dialogue in the edit.  

AESTHETICS 

Golden hue for the 60’s – light colours show good memories, yellow indicates sepia tones, heat 

Second half is colder colours – connotations of change in the favelas 

The film uses a lot of grungy, street aesthetics, as well as an attempt to create a feeling of documentary realism.  

The film uses aesthetic elements of social realism constantly. The film is set in Brazilian favelas and follows lower class people, it was filmed within the favelas, and it’s based on a real story and real people.