Dissenting Opinion

Rating: 6/10 (18 June 2003)

With nothing but rousing praise leading me into the theater, I should have expected such a disappointingly inauthentic and stylistically inappropriate film. City of God is not half as depressing as others suggest, or as it should be, and the dialogue throughout is embarrassingly generic. It had a glossy texture with doses of disturbing violence mixed into a mostly nostalgic and derivative coming of age story. While I was never bored - there's certainly no lack of action or story telling energy - I never felt connected to these one-dimensional characters (except sometimes Benny). People are introduced and killed off before we could ever feel emotionally connected to them (in this way the comparison to Pulp Fiction is valid, though Pulp Fiction was PULP, and this is supposed to be a meaningful film about the plight of street kids in Rio). Overall, it's a big budget after school special. For a real film on the subject check out Bunuel's Los Olvidados.