The City of God: Eye Opener

Rating: 10/10 (14 October 2018)

SPOILER ALERT!
The City of God is a refreshing perspective on life. The film opens with the sharpening of a knife and chicken killing occurring only within mere seconds. This foreshadows the films fast pace life throughout Rio De Janeiro, Brazil. The opening scene teaches the audience Brazil's culture, including dancing, eating, and even its violence. The audience grows with the characters, allowing them to understand where they came from. This drama keeps us intrigued with its fast pace movements, following characters such as the chicken being chased down by Lil Zé and his followers. For most, this film is an eye opener based on a true story. It showed the audience the prevalence of drug dealing, violence, and "not seeing anything" in Brazil. The film demonstrates violence learned at an early age that evolves into great brutality. The corruption in the film along with violence does not go away when a violent character dies, it only continues. When police capture Lil Zé and rob him of his valuables, he is left with nothing and his young followers take advantage of him and kill him. The younger followers essentially take over his position. The main character, Rocket shows represents who we all would like to be, not resorting to violence when things do not work out.
Mise-en-scene is significant for instance in Lil Zé's death scene, we see the countless bullets in his back and nobody around him. This shows us LiL Zé's loneliness and violence only continues with more violence. Throughout the movie, young or old, violence did not have any restrictions. The use of panning, hand held camera, and short shots all helped advance the film and portray the chaotic slum. The film begins with a bright yellow, orange colors, but evolved to darker colors such as blue towards the end. The directors used this to tell the audience there has been a change of innocence to blood bath murders. Flashbacks are used throughout the film that aid in connecting the entire film. The directors were successful in creating a exhilarating film that flows very well!