City of God (Portuguese: Cidade de Deus) is a 2002 Brazilian crime drama film directed by Fernando Meirelles and co-directed by Kátia Lund, released in its home country in 2002 and worldwide in 2003. The story was adapted by Bráulio Mantovani from the 1997 novel of the same name written by Paulo Lins, but the plot is loosely based on real events. It depicts the growth of organized crime in the Cidade de Deus suburb of Rio de Janeiro, between the end of the 1960s and the beginning of the 1980s, with the closure of the film depicting the war between the drug dealer Li'l Zé and vigilante-turned-criminal Knockout Ned. The tagline is "If you run, the beast catches you; if you stay, the beast eats you", a proverb analogous to the English "Damned if you do, damned if you don't".
The cast includes Alexandre Rodrigues, Leandro Firmino da Hora, Phellipe Haagensen, Douglas Silva, Alice Braga and Seu Jorge. Most of the actors were, in fact, residents of favelas such as Vidigal and the Cidade de Deus itself.
The film attained worldwide critical acclaim, receiving four Academy Award nominations in 2004: Best Cinematography (César Charlone), Best Directing (Meirelles), Best Editing (Daniel Rezende) and Best Writing (Adapted Screenplay) (Mantovani). Before that, in 2003 it had been chosen to be Brazil's runner for the Academy Award for Best Foreign Language Film, but it was not nominated to be one of the five finalists. If it had been nominated, it would have been ineligible the next year for any other category. The film continued to attain worldwide critical acclaim.
Meirelles and Lund went on to create the City of Men TV series and film City of Men, which share some of the actors (notably leads Douglas Silva and Darlan Cunha) and their setting with City of God.
Plot
Chickens are being prepared for a meal when a chicken escapes and an armed gang chases after it in a favela called the Cidade de Deus ("City of God"). The chicken stops between the gang and a young man named Rocket (Buscapé), who believes that the gang wants to kill him. A flashback traces Rocket, the narrator, back to the 1960s. He lived incredibly poor.
Three impoverished, amateur thieves known as the "Tender Trio" â€" Shaggy, Clipper, and Goose â€" rob and loot business owners; Goose is Rocket's brother. The thieves split part of the loot with the citizens of the City, and are protected by them in return. Several younger boys idolize the trio and one, Li'l Dice (Dadinho), convinces them to hold up a motel and rob its occupants. The gang agrees, resolving not to kill anyone, and tell Li'l Dice to serve as lookout. They give him a gun and tell him to fire a warning shot if the police arrive but an unsatisfied Li'l Dice fires a warning shot mid-robbery and guns down the motel inhabitants once the gang have run off. The massacre brings the attention of the police, forcing the trio to split up: Clipper joins the church, Shaggy is shot by the police while trying to escape the favela, and Goose is shot by Li'l Dice after taking the thieving boy's money while his friend Benny (Bené) watches.
Later in the '70s, Rocket has joined a group of young hippies. He enjoys photography, and likes one girl, but his attempts to get close to her are ruined by a group of petty criminal kids known as "The Runts". Li'l Dice now calls himself "Li'l Zé" ("Zé Pequeno"), and along with Benny has established a drug empire by eliminating all of the competition, except for one dealer named Carrot, and forcing Carrot's manager Blackie (Neguinho) to work for him instead.
A relative peace has come over the City of God under the reign of Li'l Zé, who avoids police attention by having an initiate kill a Runt. Zé plans to kill Carrot, but Benny talks him out of it.
Eventually, Benny and his girlfriend decide to leave the City, but during the farewell party Zé is distracted, and Blackie accidentally kills Benny while trying to shoot Li'l Zé. As Benny was the only man holding Zé back from taking over Carrot's business, his death leaves Zé unchecked and Carrot kills Blackie for endangering his life.
Following Benny's death, Zé beats up a peaceful man named Knockout Ned and rapes Ned's girlfriend. After Ned's brother stabs Zé, his gang retaliates by killing his brother and firing on Ned's house and killing his uncle. Ned, looking for revenge, sides with Carrot and eventually a war breaks out between Carrot and Zé.
As the '80's begin, both sides enlist more "soldiers", with Zé providing weapons for the Runts and eventually the reason for the war is forgotten. One day, Zé has Rocket take photos of him and his gang. After Rocket leaves his film with a friend who works at a newspaper, a female reporter publishes one of the prints, since nobody can get into the City of God anymore. Rocket takes a romantic interest in the reporter, eventually losing his virginity to her.
Rocket thinks his life is endangered but agrees to continue taking photographs, not realizing Zé is very pleased with increased notoriety. Rocket then returns to the City for more photographs, bringing the film to its beginning. Confronted by the gang, Rocket is surprised that Zé is asking him to take pictures, but as he prepares to take the photo after forgetting the chicken, the police arrive, who drive off when Carrot arrives. In the gunfight, Ned is killed by a boy who has infiltrated his gang to avenge his father, a security guard who was killed by Ned during a bank robbery. The police capture Li'l Zé and Carrot, planning to give the media Carrot, whose gang never paid off the police, while they steal Zé's money and let him go. He is then murdered by the Runts who intend to run the criminal enterprise themselves. Rocket secretly takes pictures of both scenes, as well as Zé's dead body, and brings them back to the newspaper.
Rocket is seen in the newspaper office looking at all of his photographs through a magnifying glass, and deciding whether to publish the photo of corrupt cops and become famous or the photo of Li'l Zé's body and get an internship. He decides on the latter and the film ends with the Runts walking around the City of God, making a hit list of the dealers they plan to kill in order to take over the drug business. They mention that a Comando Vermelho ("Red Command") is coming.
Cast
Many characters are known only by nicknames. The literal translation of these nicknames is given next to their original Portuguese name; the names given in English subtitles are sometimes different.
Production
On the bonus DVD, it is revealed that the only professional actor with years of filming experience was Matheus Nachtergaele, who played the supporting role of Carrot. Most of the remaining cast were from real-life favelas, and in some cases, even the real-life City of God favela itself. According to Meirelles, amateur actors were used for two reasons: the lack of available professional black actors, and the desire for authenticity. Meirelles explained: "Today I can open a casting call and have 500 black actors, but just ten years ago this possibility did not exist. In Brazil there were three or four young black actors and at the same time I felt that actors from the middle class could not make the film. I needed authenticity." Beginning about 2000, about a hundred children and young people were hand-picked and placed into an "actors' workshop" for several months. In contrast to more traditional methods (e.g. studying theatre and rehearsing), it focused on simulating authentic street war scenes, such as a hold-up, a scuffle, a shoot-out etc. A lot came from improvisation, as it was thought better to create an authentic, gritty atmosphere. This way, the inexperienced cast soon learned to move and act naturally.
Prior to City of God, Lund and Meirelles filmed the short film Golden Gate as a sort of test run. Only after then was the casting for City of God finalized. He also made a couple other shorts.
Appropriately, the film ends eavesdropping on the machinations of the "Runts" as they assemble their death list. The real gang "Caixa Baixa" (Low Gang) is rumored to have composed such a list. After filming, the crew could not leave the cast to return to their old lives in the favelas. Help groups were set up to help those involved in the production to build more promising futures.
Reception
Box office
The film was screened out of competition at the 2002 Cannes Film Festival. In Brazil, City of God garnered the largest audience for a domestic film in 2003, with over 300.1Â million tickets sold, and a gross of 180.6Â million reais ($10.3Â million). The film grossed over $7.5 million in the U.S. and over $30.5 million worldwide (in U.S. Dollars).
Critical reception
City of God gathered 90% favourable reviews on Rotten Tomatoes. Empire chose it as the 177th best film of all time in 2008, and TIME chose it as one of the 100 greatest films of all time. Critic Roger Ebert gave the film a four-star review, writing "'City of God' churns with furious energy as it plunges into the story of the slum gangs of Rio de Janeiro. Breathtaking and terrifying, urgently involved with its characters, it announces a new director of great gifts and passions: Fernando Meirelles. Remember the name.".
City of God was ranked third in Film4's "50 Films to See Before You Die", and ranked No.7 in Empire magazine's "The 100 Best Films Of World Cinema" in 2010. It was also ranked No.6 on The Guardian '​s list of "the 25 Best Action Movies Ever". It was ranked 1# in Paste magazine's 50 best movies of the decade of the 2000s.
Top ten lists
The film appeared on several American critics' top ten lists of the best films of 2003.
- 2nd â€" Chicago Sun Times (Roger Ebert)
- 2nd â€" Charlotte Observer (Lawrence Toppman)
- 2nd â€" Chicago Tribune (Marc Caro)
- 4th â€" New York Post (Jonathan Foreman)
- 4th â€" Time Magazine (Richard Corliss)
- 5th â€" Portland Oregonian (Shawn Levy)
- 7th â€" Chicago Tribune (Michael Wilmington)
- 10th â€" Hollywood Reporter (Michael Rechtshaffen)
- 10th â€" New York Post (Megan Lehmann)
- 10th â€" New York Times (Stephen Holden)
Awards and nominations
City of God won fifty-five awards and received another twenty-nine nominations. Among those:
Music
The score to the film composed by Antonio Pinto and Ed Córtes. It was followed by two remix albums. Songs from the film:
- "Alvorada" (Cartola / Carlos Cachaça / Herminio B. Carvalho) - Cartola
- "Azul Da Cor Do Mar" (Tim Maia) - Tim Maia
- "Dance Across the Floor" (Harry Wayne Casey / Ronald Finch) - Jimmy Bo Horne
- "Get Up (I Feel Like Being a) Sex Machine" (James Brown / Bobby Byrd / Ronald R. Lenhoff) - James Brown
- "Hold Back the Water" (Randy Bachman / Robin Bachman / Charles Turner) - Bachmanâ€"Turner Overdrive
- "Hot Pants Road" (Charles Bobbit / James Brown / St Clair Jr Pinckney) - The J.B.'s
- "Kung Fu Fighting" (Carl Douglas) - Carl Douglas
- "Magrelinha" (Luiz Melodia) - Luiz Melodia
- "Metamorfose Ambulante" (Raul Seixas) - Raul Seixas
- "Na Rua, Na Chuva, Na Fazenda" (Hyldon) - Hyldon
- "Nem Vem Que Não Tem" (Carlos Imperial) - Wilson Simonal
- "O Caminho Do Bem" (Sérgio / Beto / Paulo) - Tim Maia
- "Preciso Me Encontrar" (Candeia) - Cartola
- "So Very Hard To Go" (Emilio Castillo / Stephen M. Kupka) - Tower of Power
See also
- Docufiction
- List of docufiction films
- Boyz n the Hood
References
External links
- Official website
- Official website (Portuguese)
- City of God at the Internet Movie Database
- City of God at AllMovie
- City of God at Box Office Mojo
- City of God at Rotten Tomatoes
- City of God at Metacritic
