Hacker Cinema
City of God
Cidade de Deus
2002 · Film · 129 min
Directed by Fernando Meirelles
In the poverty-stricken favelas of Rio de Janeiro in the 1970s, two young men choose different paths. Rocket is a budding photographer who documents the increasing drug-related violence of his neighborhood, while José “Zé” Pequeno is an ambitious drug dealer diving into a dangerous life of crime.
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29 comments on Hacker News
I definitely like that film, especially the acting and the music, but I think that, as with most material that covers that era (arts, history, journalism), it focuses on the middle and the upper classes.
The poor get a footnote: what happened to Zezé? But the poor were the biggest losers of the dictatorship. It was at the precise moment that the country needed to modernise that the coup made everything stop and the favelas grew along with violence in the periphery. Maybe City of God is a better depiction of what the dictatorship meant.
For those who don’t know: the film City of God is based on this, and it’s a great movie. One of my all-time favorites. The directing, acting photography and storytelling are all very well done. Worth anyone’s time.
> Tokyo Story
I watched it because it's on every list of best films, so expectations going in were high. It's not overrated. I don't cry from movies but I did when watching this one. Very subtle and relatable.
Edit: Since we're here, "The Fall" (2006) and "City of God" (2002) are some of my other favorites.
Even if you thought another movie was gonna be as good as City of God right now, do you think you'd be as likely to actually go to the cinema to see it as you were in 2002 or might you simply wait, safe $20 and a trip and watch it at home 3 months later? I think both factors play a role and they have synergy as well. Fewer people go to the cinema -> smaller market and less incentive to take risks -> fewer people go to the cinema -> ...
I was going to say, were movies really that good in 2002?
Catch Me If You Can
Gangs of New York
The Pianist
City of God
Yes, yes they were lol. It is almost hard to believe those all came out in the same year.
Imagine in 2025 having to pick if you want to see The Pianist or City of God? It is just so unthinkable
I do prefer Koyaanisqatsi to any movie that thinks it has a plot but really just has a bunch of surround sound and vibrant colors signifying nothing. Koyaanisqatsi is great for putting on a large flatscreen in the backround while you're playing a board game with friends.
My favorite movie of all time is City of God -- tons of plot, compelling characters, realistic situation, great music, a totally immersive experience. I consider it the greatest movie ever made in spite of the fact that you have to watch it with subtitles unless you speak Portuguese.
My favorite movie of all time is City of God, which is entirely in Portugese. Somehow the captions don't lessen that movie for me at all.
I grew up in Rio de Janeiro right next to a few favelas. I also served time in the Brazilian army (mandatory drafting) for 12 months and was not only surrounded by guys from all types of favelas but was stationed on the border of the Maré Complex.[0]
Trust me. I know a thing or two about favelas.
I could write a book about it but I’ll stick to the topics on the OP’s article and some recurrent topics in the comments, some very unfounded.
The answer to how people below the poverty line can afford technology is simple: donations and debt.
It’s _very_ common in Brazil to accrue debt by buying things “parcelado” or in instalments on your credit card. Next to one one pays the full amount upfront for a meaningful purchase. Wanna buy a smartphone for $USD200? Pay 10x $USD23 over 10 months.
Why are these expensive gadgets not stolen? Of course they are. However not as commonly as one might guess, it’s virtually impossible to commit a crime unseen in a favela. There’s very little to no privacy at all. A mixture of citizen justice (wife beaters for example are routinely bashed by crowds of people) and drug dealers’ willingness to assert authority keeps most stupid thefts in check.
Favela residents will go to surprising lengths to acquire “escape”. In the 1990s it was the parabolic antenna and a tv. With the intro of cheap android devices and 3G it became social media and YouTube. As the price for VR drops it’ll be that.
Much before Facebook there was a social media app that exploded in Brazil, it was called Orkut, it was a reflection of the need for escape.
Also, with the advent of more and more cheap laptops, the promise of easy NFT/Crypto money and a magical job as a coder it’s becoming more and more common to see laptop ownership.
I see what Mr Chantilly is trying to do and it’s easy to dismiss it as a single fart in the galaxy but he helps keep some kids off the streets, gives them a bit of hope. Hopefully they learn more than League of Legends and come out of it speaking a little English and more comfortable using a pc.
What’s needed in Rio and Brazil is a multi-generational educational investment. It’ll never happen of course. Populist demagogues like Lula da Silva will keep being re-elected to “save the poor”. By rubber stamping high school certificates for people that can’t read why buying their votes with free food. Every 8 years or so they’ll rob so much they’ll get thrown out, a moron from the right will be elected, and the left will come back in again to reinstate the good times. Meanwhile a huge brain drain perpetuates.
Now on another note. If you’re a tourist in Rio STAY THE FUCK AWAY from any favelas. If you _must_ engage in poverty zoo/safari make sure you go with a trusted, long time in the market, tour guide and don’t forget at any time that you’re putting your life at risk. At any moment, there could be a police operation or a rival drug dealing gang using weapons of war in your immediate vicinity.
No I’m not exaggerating. I was shot at by AR15 and M16 rifles and returned fire with my shitty Belgium made FAL during an attempted “hit and run” on the barracks I was stationed at where a couple of maniacs on crack will jump the walls and try to get out with ammunition and rifles.
These days a lot of the hardcore drug gangs (or factions as they are often called in Rio) have been displaced by what most people would think of more classic mafia. Protection money, extra “taxes”, money loans, etc. These organisations are mostly comprised of corrupt ex and current policemen and low rank army personnel and therefore much more capable and educated than 90% of the dealers they displaced.
If you want to watch three great but extremely violent movies that explain this shift in power, watch these 3 in this order.
“City of God” - basically how violent drug dealing started in Rio back in the 70s. [1]
“Elite Squad” - the state of the war of drugs in Rio during the 90s. [2]
“Elite Squad 2 - Enemy within” - how it is was in the late 00s [3]
[0] https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Maré,_Rio_de_Janeiro
[1] https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/City_of_God_(2002_film)
[2] https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Elite_Squad
[3] https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Elite_Squad:_The_Enemy_Within
City of God (and the documentary that was a special feature of the DVD and was better than the film)
Hector and the Search for Happiness
Ghost in the Shell (as someone else mentioned)
Bit of a sidetrack but you did say BJJ so I had to say something. Also, did you see "Cidade De Deus"[1]? The planned suburbs in that film were... what you described, I think. Also, I watched that goofy movie "Suburbia"[2] back in the day as well. There's a sort of similar gestalt the both share that I can't quite quantify in words or graphs but it's there.
[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/City_of_God_(2002_film)
[2] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Suburbia_(film)
I remember watching City of God with someone and afterwards asking about the subtitles. "What subtitles?" He hadn't noticed he was reading subtitles. Raved about the film, though; aware that they must have been speaking Portuguese, but with genuinely no memory of the non-English language or the subtitles.
For some reason City of God to me was just some stylizing ... on top of some shocking violence that happened to involve a lot of kids. I really missed whatever was supposed to be great about that film...
I'd certainly add City of God and City of Men to that list.
Along with Elite Squad, these movies are simply amazing.
Wagner Moura. the main character in Elite Squad, also stars as Pablo Escobar in Netflix's original series Narcos.
https://www.imdb.com/name/nm0609944/?ref_=tt_cl_t1
There was a documentary on the City of God DVD that was better than the film (and I thought it was an amazing film).
A few from Netflix that I could find that I rated:
Endless Summer
Death in Gaza
The Filth and the Fury
Jiro Dreams of Sushi
Baseball
March of the Penguins
The Art of the Steal
Born Into Brothels
The Aristocrats
God Grew Tired of Us
The Fog of War
The Lost Wave
The Last Waltz
Festival Express
What I don't understand is how Netflix ended up this way. They attributed the success of a show like House of Cards to their data science capabilities - why would they produce bad movies unless that's what the data points to. Then maybe no matter what, the truth is that the content that gets eyeballs, and why Hollywood makes shallow broad movies is the same: they make money.
If you want to watch some actual quality filmmaking, visit a film festival or watch some Criterion films. Everything else will be "trash". If you want to expand your cinematic palate, explore American noir (The Maltese Falcon), melodrama (Douglas Sirk), musical (Singin' in the Rain), Western (The Good, The Bad, and The Ugly), epic (Lawrence of Arabia). Italian neorealism with The Bicycle Thief, French New Wave with Jean Luc Godard (Breathless). Want to go modern international, City of God, Gomorra, Wong Kar Wai, Park Chan Wook's Oldboy (advisory warning), or my favorite Japanese auteur Yasujiro Ozu.
Any of the above films are considered cinematic gems. Recommendations brought to you by my degree in Cinema and Cultural Studies. The true beauty of filmmaking is conversation over time. Films and directors talk to each other like authors and artists, they write love letters. They become self-aware of their medium (Fellini), "postmodern".
Great film can not fall in the limited boundaries of popular filmmaking. That's why Hollywood films tend to be so broad and shallow, to be palatable by all, no alienation, unless when it comes to race or gender. On the other hand, that problem is not unique to Hollywood or filmmaking.
One of my favorite movies of all time is City of God, which is about Brazilian favelas. You can make movies about poor people that are just as entertaining and compelling as any movie about super spies or whatever.
If you haven't already, watch the movie "City of God". You'll get a pretty good idea about the background for this kind of people in Brasil.
I find it disappointing that the films on this list are overwhelmingly old. Sure, many of these were groundbreaking and influential in their time, but filmmaking has come such a long way since the days of Hitchcock, for example.
In his original list, "City of Gods" (which he didn't even spell correctly-- the english title is "City of God") is the only film made in the last 2 decades.
His updated list, which was supposed to be more inclusive to women, adds Apocalypto, District 9, Kung Fu Hustle, and Dirty Pretty Things, all of which are directed by men-- and he even removed "City of Gods", one of the few movies from the original list that had a female (co)director.
In fact, the entire list reads like a giant insult to all of Lee's contemporaries. Does he want every aspiring filmmaker to enter the business with antiquated sensibilities about cinematography?
He's coming across like the smug high-schooler who just discovered Led Zeppelin and declares that they're the greatest band of all time, and all modern music is crap.
mainstream: American beauty, Pulp fiction, No country for old men, American History X, Saving Private Ryan, Taken, The pianist
classics: Lawrence of Arabia, The Shawshank Redemption, 2001: A Space Odyssey, Terminator I & II
hipster: Knife in the water (Polanski), Come and See (Idi i smotri - best war movie I've seen), Haute Tension (french horror movie), Requiem for a Dream, Trainspotting, City of God, Blue Is the Warmest Color, Goodbye Lenin, The cube
City of God (Cicade de Deus) is a great movie about this, too.
IIRC, what you are referring to is in the text-epilogue/credits of the film. It said something along the lines of 'the Camorra even invested in the reconstruction of the Twin Towers.' Agreed that it was a somewhat bizarre 2-3 seconds of information. But I don't remember the film explicitly connecting them (or insinuating connection) to the attacks, just the reconstruction investment.
It's excellent otherwise. Especially in that it doesn't romanticize "the lifestyle"; which is a rubbish cliché, endemic in many criminal enterprise films. Other films that I think are successful in this sense are: "City of God" (Portuguese title: "Cidade de Deus") and "Maria Full of Grace" (Spanish title: "María llena eres de gracia").
'COULD' is a complicated concept. It's something I struggle with too, when I watch movies like 'City of God', where mostly I ask myself 'why the hell don't these kids leave the city. or the country.'
Or The Wire where a kid who 'got out' decides to come back.
There are many factors that play a role in the options we have, and the strongest factors have nothing to do with what's objectively best.
Psychologically speaking, it's a bit dangerous (and too easy) to say that poor people should just stop living their poor lifestyles and leave their poor friends and poor family for a world totally unknown to them. This is also true for addicts, or homeless people. I've come to know quite a few of both, and if anything I've started to respect the difficulty of their situation.
In regards to Elite Squad, I suggest the complementary (actually the other way around) City of God http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0317248/
My favourite:
Let the right one in (the original version), beautiful atmospheric movie: http://akas.imdb.com/title/tt1139797
Other recommendations:
City of God, harsh but realistic: http://akas.imdb.com/title/tt0317248
Barefoot Gen, shock and awe, made me cry, IMHO better than Grave of the Fireflies: http://akas.imdb.com/title/tt0085218/
The Chaser, breathtaking thriller: http://akas.imdb.com/title/tt1190539/
The Andromeda Strain, now this is real SF: http://akas.imdb.com/title/tt0066769
The Man from Earth, good low budget SF: http://akas.imdb.com/title/tt0756683
Castaway on the Moon: funny movie about a man that 'bootstraps' his life on a 'stranded island' after a failed suicide attempt: http://www.imdb.com/title/tt1499666/
I saw the devil, violent but very good thriller: http://akas.imdb.com/title/tt1588170/?ref_=sr_1
Off the off topic: why is the English world so intent on translating everything? (Much like the French world I guess)
In the Dutch speaking part of Belgium we try to refer to most movies in their original language (Das Leben Der Anderen, Cidade De Deus, ...), though we do seem to have trouble with Asian titles where we for some obscure reason default to using the English title. Edit: We do translate children's movies.
What specifically do you think is missing? Remember, it's only the 20 most popular films in a given year.
Oldboy (Korea), City of God (Brazil), Pan's Labyrinth (Mexico), and Spirited Away (Japan) are all on those, and that's not an exhaustive list.
- I Heart Huckabees - You, Me And Everyone We Know - Juno - The Straight Story - My Neighbour Totoro
Are all straight forward feel good movies.
- Caché - The Lives Of Others - The White Ribbon - The Fountain - Amores Perros - City Of God - Fargo - Dune - Castle In The Sky - Nausicaä of the Valley of the Wind - Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind - Festen
Make you feel good simply by the presence of their across the board brilliance.
* Life is beautiful
* Last Train Home
* Brokeback mountain
* Slumdog Millionare
* Aftershocks (Tangshan dadizhen)
* Bus 174
* Moon
* The Wire (TV series)
* Zorba the greek
* City of God
Fight Club : A bit over the top, but works for me.
Cidade de Deus (City of God) : Overcoming adversity, based on real life story.
Le fabuleux destin d'Amelie Poulain (Amelie) : Beautiful movie about seeing the world in a different way. Love is worth fighting for. Don't be afraid to be eccentric.
Das Leben der Anderen (The Lives Of Others) : Even the harshest repressive regimes cannot re-educate and brainwash all the humanity out of people.
Das Boot : How I feel when I need to finish a project while the management throws "depth charges" (feature requests ;-) ) at me.
Hotel Rwanda : People are capable of both extreme violence and extreme kindness.
Zerkalo (The Mirror) by Tarkovksy : Nostalgia. Reminds me to keep connected to my parents and family. Eventually they'll be gone, with only dreams and memory fragments of them left.