I just saw "City of God" yesterday. Ask me (or tell me) anything.

[drumwolf]

Questions? Comments?

[Swamp Rat]

1. Well, I spent last year in Brasil, though only a few weeks in Rio.

I met Matheus Nachtergaele in Fortaleza and rode on the plane with him to Rio de Janeiro. He's a really nice guy and a great actor. I liked him best as "João Grillo" in "Auto da Compadecida." I went to a few different favelas with friends and once by myself. It's very dangerous depending on who you meet, though I didn't have any problems.

[drumwolf]

3. ok, my turn to ask.....

What were you doing in Brazil and how did you get to meet Carrot? I'm sure it would have been way cool to actually meet one of the actual cast members from that film.

I was already somewhat familiar with the general situation in Rio's favelas and knew that street kids were going around killing each other and getting killed. That shit apparently happens in other parts of Latin America too ("Our Lady of the Assassins" depicts a very similar lifestyle, except that it takes place in Medellin, Colombia).

[Swamp Rat]

11. Just happened to be going the same way by VARIG airline.

Brazil is a lot bigger than any one film, so if you have the interest, I suggest you go there for at least 6 months (tourist VISA limit). Quit your job or school, sell your house - whatever. Just get enough money to go there, live a life that cannot be described in words, and save enough money to get back to the USA unless you can get a job there and/or get married.

There is a lot of violence in some cities, but not unlike some of our own. There are many safe places as well. In many ways, though they are poor, Brazilians are more free as a people than are we. As soon as Bush is kicked out power and I finish school I will be moving back there, even if I only earn $500.00 a month.

I lived in Costa Rica on and off over five years, so if you want a really safe and stable Latin American country to visit go there.

[Bombtrack]

2. Definetly the best subtitled movie ever

they definetly should make a dubbed version for people not focused enough to read subs.

Or I wonder if they'd ever consider remaking it in English, although Rio is sort of a character in the movie. Maybe they could set in the LA Ghetto or something during the 60's and 70's.

[drumwolf]

4. they would have to set it someplace

with a history similar to the actual Cidade De Deus favela in Rio. That whole neighborhood was originally a public housing project for the city's poor that the government built in the '60s, and then in the subsequent decade the civil society in that area just crumbled and the gangs took over.

Come to think of it, unfortunately, that seems to be the story of a lot of the government housing projects that were built in the '60s -- in Brazil, here in the U.S., and even in European cities like Paris where Arab guest workers were housed.

[HuckleB]

5. Great flick.

Do you speak Portuguese?

[drumwolf]

7. nope.

The subtitles were extremely well done, though. I find that a lot of foreign films don't have subtitles that are translated well so that the characters actually seem like they're speaking real dialogue.

And I've heard that even if you do speak Portuguese, that's no guarantee you'll necessarily understand the dialogue. I'm sure their speech is very heavy on local slang.

[HuckleB]

8. Subtitles.

Yeah, there's no doubt that subtitles are rushed and done poorly on many movies, though I think we're actually fairly lucky in the states, as the quality, by and large, is vastly better than what I've noted in theatres in Spain, Argentina and France, when watching movies made in English with Spanish or French subtitles. So often it seems like they're done simply as a guide to help the moviegoer get through the movie rather than to offer a reasonable facsimile of the dialogue and its context.

Not that dubbed movies are better, mind you, with the exception of Keanu Reeves and Christian Slater, both of whom are much better dubbed in Spanish!

[Swamp Rat]

12. Yeah, I speak Portuguese pretty well but the Carioca was mixed with

street slang. Most of the street slang I know is from the Northeast - very different than from the Southeast - Imagine the difference between Boston and Houston or LA and Chicago. Even Brazilians I know said some of the lingo was weird.

[truthspeaker]

13. Isn't Portugal Portugese fairly different from Brazilian Portugese?

I know they're mutually intelligible, but I had heard there were noticeably differences (even more so than British vs. American English).

[Commie Pinko Dirtbag]

15. They're THIS close from becoming two different languages.

I suspect that in two hundred years a language called "Brazilian" will be officially recognized.

[Swamp Rat]

17. They are VERY different.

I met a few Portuguese while in Brasil. I was filming a band that played for some wealthy Europeans who own a restaurant when I met them. They were very difficult to understand (for me) unless they spoke slowly, and every time they left the table the Brazilians would make fun of them by imitating their dialect... this was very entertaining.

[Commie Pinko Dirtbag]

18. The Portuguese are THE universal butt of jokes over here

Think Poles, parrots, pirates, nuns, rabbis, Dubya, Clinton, and Monica Lewinsky, combined.

Argentinians run a distant second.

[Swamp Rat]

19. HAHAHAHA! ... poles parrots and pirates! valeu grande!

Como vai cara? Te escrevei um "PM" faz um mês. Não tinha lido?

[Commie Pinko Dirtbag]

20. Oh crap, it slipped through into the memory hole.

Funny how most DUers who have something to do with Brazil are musicians. It'd be nice if you and Squeech visited here at the same time.

[Swamp Rat]

21. Who is Squeech? Does he/she play chôro?

I'm not very good at it (I do play some Villa-Lobos pieces on the violão), and I'm still a beginner playing surdo and pandeiro, but I love this music. Our music in New Orleans is very similar, but not like Pixinguinha. I have a few musician friends in Rio and I've stayed in Copacabana and Santa Teresa. The chôro bars are great but I also like the maracatu/funky sound. I've partied (and filmed) in the Casa Rosa (?) where it used to be a house of prostitution but is now a music club - super legal!

If I had the money to live there, I would finish my doctorate at UF do Rio porque I LOVE it there. My second night there I went to a João Bosco concert and I got to sit right next to Caetano Veloso. I've got a few photos but I don't want to post them here.

[Commie Pinko Dirtbag]

22. Squeech in a nutshell

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_topic&forum=111&topic_id=26218

He's coming over.

[Swamp Rat]

23. Seems like nice folks

I met Ann Arbor Dem right after I regestered at DU... we are both intersted in Brazilian music. I grew up listening to it here in New Orleans because my mother had many Brazilian friends when I was small. I was the only child that knew who Pele was and the only one in this city that knew and liked Garrincha.

I'm glad the Squeeches will be going to Minas - I love Ouro Preto so much I stayed a week there, right in the Praza Tiradentes. I went to 9 different states and up the coast until Fortaleza (actually Jericoacoara). Next time I want to go to Maranhão, Amazonas, and down South to Florinopolis, Blumenau, and Porto Alegre... the best is Rio as far as I'm concerned, but I love all of Brasil. I should have been born there.

[sundog]

6. Amazing movie

really blew me away...

[tigerbeat]

9. funny...i watched it monday night....

really engaging film i thought. well-structured and extremely well-shot. near as i can tell the acting is quite good too...but in subtitled films it's sometimes hard to know if the quality of the acting gets lost through the language filter.

[htuttle]

10. Wow, we just watched it last night

There were a lot of really great things about it. The story was really compelling, and the direction and camera work were very good. I really liked the device of cutting away to tell the 'substories' like "The Story of the Apartment", etc...

Great movie all around (but not for the faint of heart).

[m-jean03]

14. I watched it in the theater just as the US was beginning to bomb Iraq

I felt like it said a lot about human nature and how fighting and killing becomes an addiction, with that vicious cycle of revenge feeding it.

It was an excellent movie.

[drumwolf]

16. vicious cycle of revenge

Yeah, and it did a brilliant job of showing how fundamentally good people can get swept by external forces into a life of violent crime. The prime example of that was Knockout Ned, who starts out as a peaceful person.