Fernando Meirelles' and Kátia Lund's film City of God is a horrifying movie telling the story of those living in the Rio de Janeiro slum of Cidade de Deus. The film shows, in stark detail, how dangerous and unpredictable living in the slums can be. The story is told by Rocket, a young man who only wishes to be a photographer and leave the slum. He tells the story of how the drug lord Li'l Zé rises to power in Cidade de Deus and eventually is killed by a pack of children that he himself armed with guns. The story ends with Rocket getting a job with the local newspaper as a photographer and with Li'l Zé dead, but with no answers in sight for the rest of the slum. This film does an excellent job in depicting the awful conditions, the corruption, and the violence that poor people see and experience on a daily basis in many places in Latin America.
From the outset, the audience sees that the government of Brazil is trying to shove a problem to the side with the establishment of the Cidade de Deus. After building the city for many of Rio de Janeiro's poor, the government largely leaves the area alone, allowing the slum to spiral into a place where drugs and violence are prevalent and unpredictability rules. The people find that there are very few options for them and that it is especially hard to find a way out and become even somewhat successful. Instead, the power hungry gain power by killing and making others scared of them by building a reputation of ruthlessness, as exhibited by the rise of Li'l Zé. The most upsetting part about this trend is that children who look to be as young as 7 years old or younger are the ones carrying out these acts many times. In the case of Li'l Zé, it seems that he has built up rage in himself given his living circumstances and finds that killing is a way to exercise that rage in a satisfying way. After this first slaughter, he realizes how easy it can be to gain power through violence and force as the police and government are virtually nonexistent or can be paid off to turn a blind eye to infractions. This ultimately causes the policing force of the slum to become the person with the most power, Li'l Zé.
I was able to draw two main points that the directors were trying to drive home to the audience. The first is that, no matter what your values, it is very easy to be drawn into the violence, drug abuse, and corruption of the slum and that a small personal matter can be blown into a full out gang war. This is shown in the case of Knockout Ned. After Li'l Zé rapes his girlfriend, kills his brother, and shoots up his house, Ned simply wants to kill the drug lord, but instead causes a gang war that rages for a long time, drawing more and more people into the feud. Previous to the incident with Zé, Ned does not believe in violence or being a hood, but tries to find his way out of the slum through hard work. The slum draws him back in, however, and though he continually asks why small children join the altercation, he does not stop them, ultimately leading to his own death.
The end of the film seems to make the most important and second point of the film. It makes the point that even though the war between Li'l Zé and Knockout Ned is over, that the problems of Cidade de Deus continue on, in the children of the area that are around the same age as Li'l Zé when he began his rule. It shows that though a few people, like Rocket, may be able to find an honest living, the predominant way up the status ladder is through killing and selling drugs. Children aspire to become like Li'l Zé and ultimately die because of it. These children do not stand a chance against the world as they tote pistols and do not understand what they are doing. It is also interesting to note that there are no parental figures or government figures for the children to look up to and are literally forced to see people like Li'l Zé as heroes rather than bloodthirsty and power hungry menaces.
Ultimately, I think that this film truly lived up to expectations. I had heard that this movie was one of the best films ever made, let alone a great modern or foreign film, and I agree. The storytelling style like that of Goodfellas adds a personal flavor to it, the cameras do a great job of capturing each detail, facial expression, and time of chaos, and the acting truly shows the raw emotion and unpredictability of Cidade de Deus. Most importantly, however, City of God gets the conveys the message to the viewer that these people live in a perpetual downward spiral that likely will never change, improve, or stop.
