City of God and Third World Film Theory

One of the keys to understanding Third World Cinema is appreciating and interrogating why an individual film is made. The original scholars of Third Cinema stated that theirs was not a cinema meant to make the viewer feel at ease, but instead it should make them want to question and change the world. This is one of the many differences between Third World Cinema and Hollywood film. While either can be entertaining, the filmmakers from each set have different goals when making a film. Cinema that is produced in Brazil falls into the Third Cinema category, but it retains enough similarities to Hollywood as to not be completely off-putting to American spectators. Modern Brazilian cinema takes lessons from the notions of Third Cinema and its theory, but is evolving just like the cinema from every country. City of God (2002) has been by one the most successful Brazilian films of all time in the international marketplace grossing nearly twenty five million dollars worldwide, seven million of that in the its limited release in the United States. It was also a great success in Brazilian theatres bringing in over three million admissions. Third Cinema theory, and the way it applies to City of God as well as the ways this film moves away from these notions, can help us understand what has lead to its domestic and international appeal.

Third World film theory has been connected to the production practices of cinema in the Third World for many years. In Robert Stam’s section on Third Cinema in Film Theory: An Introduction, he discusses that the fact that it is important for Third World filmmakers to be revolutionary. The notion that films, and quality films at that, can be made in a Third World country such as Brazil is revolutionary to most Western viewers. Third Theory in the realm of Latin Cinema insists that films made in Latin American should be made by, and for, Latin American viewers. (Stam 95-96) While City of God was produced entirely in Brazil, and made by Brazilian filmmakers with a Brazilian cast, it lends itself very readily to a Western viewing audience.

Though Robert Stam and Louis Spence would argue that a Third World film need not have First World production values, City of God comes very close to these expectations at least to the point where it is not jarring for a Western audience to view the film. This fact no doubt led to the great success that City of God experienced in the United States and worldwide. In their article “Colonialism, Racism, and Representation: An Introduction” they state that audiences should never expect a film made in the Third World to adhere to the same production strategy that a Western film would. Sometimes it is impossible or inappropriate for a film from a country like Brazil to look like a Hollywood film, but this should not affect whether the audience perceives it as being well made or not. (Stam and Spence 891) The audience’s experiences of different styles of filmmaking that can be found in world cinema show that the Hollywood process of filmmaking is not the only way. However, the dominance of Hollywood film in the world marketplace makes it increasingly difficult for a film from Brazil to receive any serious commercial consideration in the United States or elsewhere. The obstacles were clearly great for this film to achieve any success in Brazil or anywhere else in the world. Hollywood films would still vie to push money away from City of God in its domestic theatres where American films and culture permeate daily life just like every other country.

Against all of these factors Fernando Meirelles and Katia Lund have constructed an extremely well made film that does not stray far from the norms of a Hollywood production. Though City of God is constructed more like an independent American film than a classically styled Hollywood production, the narrative never seeps into the realm of confusion. The film’s narrative is non-linear beginning at the film at the end of the story then flashing back and allowing the plot to work its way back to the beginning. This technique used to have a jarring effect in American films, but it has slowly become commonplace ever since it was popularized by Orson Welles in Citizen Kane (1941). The non-linear style of Braulio Mantovani’s script just seems to add to the polish of the film, making it a prime target for the average film viewer in the American art-house marketplace. City of God was also able to branch out and reach a larger audience than is typical for a foreign language film in America by appealing to Western sensibilities towards the crime-genre.

The protagonist of City of God, Rocket (Alexandre Rodrigues), is not a hero in the classical sense. He is a bookish boy who seems out of place in the impoverished crime stricken slums of Rio de Janeiro. Meirelles and Lund do an excellent job of creating audience sympathy for Rocket and turning him into our hero. He is the first person given an unobstructed line of dialogue in the film. Everything that happens before his introduction to the audience is very quick and messy. As the opening scene unfolds, Meirelles and Lund use quick cutting and snappy sound techniques to immediately pull the audience into the “exotic” world of Rio de Janeiro. The scene begins playfully enough as we witness the numerous characters try to chase down a chicken that has gotten away from them. To the rhythm of the tropical music we see many children and older chase after it as it moves through the alleyways and into the street. Even though the audience is not aware, we have been very subtly introduced to the antagonist Lil Ze (Leandro Fermino). This playful introduction is a stark contrast to the villain that we will come to fear and hate along with Rocket. Eventually the chicken makes its way to a main street and we are now shown Rocket walking along with someone else, he has a camera and is talking about how dangerous it is for him to be in this neighborhood right now. He states that if Lil Ze sees him, then he is dead. Of course at that moment Lil Ze and all of his followers come out of the alley in pursuit of the chicken all of them waving guns around to indicate their villainy and power. As Rocket is commanded to stop the chicken we notice a caravan of police men pulling into the street behind him. Rocket is now trapped in between Lil Ze’s gang and the police force. He pulls out his camera to take a picture, and we are suddenly taken back many years before hand to the moment he feels set all of these events into motion.

This elaborate and fun opening scene gives us everything we need to know about the principal characters of City of God. Lil Ze fancies himself as being playful and fun but is in fact ruthless and fickle. He just wants to prove to everyone how much power he has which is why he will not allow even a chicken to escape his control. Lil Ze also knows that he can control Rocket which is confirmed when Rocket tells his friend that how scared he is to be in this neighborhood because he believes that Lil Ze is angry at him. When Rocket is trying to retrieve the chicken for Lil Ze, he is once again the mediator between lawlessness and authority. This foreshadows the rest of the film where his actions continuously put him as the intermediary between the slums, and everyone else in Rio that has any type of power.

These narrative conventions become very straightforward especially by the time the audience has finished viewing the film. In a Hollywood sense City of God fulfills many of the requirements that a film must pass in an opening scene to set up the film for the audience. After Rocket’s flashback begins, the rest of the narrative is told in a fairly typical linear fashion except when Rocket will interrupt himself and change focus on his story. This motif is used with particular emphasis on the introduction of Knockout Ned (Seu Jorge). Rocket tells us that Ned is not important yet, but he will be. Sure enough Rocket is right as later on in the film we are told his story and made to appreciate his importance in the lives of the people of Rio. This motif gives the film a more leisurely feel and allows the viewer to feel at ease with what they are seeing on screen. The filmmaker’s political sentiments which wish to force the viewer to feel pain and sympathy for the characters and incidentally the real life people that inhabit these slums loses some of its weight because of this. In what seems like an attempt to branch out to a wider audience and make the film more pleasant to watch, Meirelles and Lund juxtapose playful scenes of their characters with other moments of brutal violence. The fact that they are willing to do this is opposed to the original idea of Third Cinema that it should agitate the viewers and be difficult to watch. Though Stam argues in Film Theory: An Introduction that Brazilian cinema will not “console or distract” (Stam 100) the viewer, but instead “prod the spectator to transform the world” (Stam 100). The filmmakers of City of God tread a fine line between Hollywood and Third World sensibilities by making their film in this fashion. Many scenes are difficult to watch and convey a clear political message while other moments make are inserted to make the film more enjoyable and coddle the viewers into a state of acceptance. Meirelles and Lund were able to reach an uncharacteristically large audience for a Brazilian film, but needed to use Western techniques to project their Third World message.

Brazil is a Third World country in terms of the definition provided by Robert Stam and Louise Spence:
“The definition of the ‘Third World’ flows logically out of this prior definition of colonialism, for the ‘Third World’ refers to the historical victims of this process—to the colonised, neo-colonised or de-colonised nations of the world whose economic and political structures have been shaped and deformed within the colonial process. (Stam and Spence 879)”
Meirelles and Lund may have benefited from the American mindset of Third World culture generating success for their film. They are able to blend a film that showcases an exotic locale, Rio de Janeiro, and insert moments that make it feel very much like an American crime film such as Bonnie and Clyde. Lil Ze is obsessed with becoming famous, he wants the world to know that he rules the slums, and he begins to like Rocket when he realizes that he has the ability to make Lil Ze famous. Bonnie and Clyde also crave celebrity; they travel around the country getting press for themselves by robbing banks and making daring escapes. Meirelles and Lund effectively take this notion of crime film, export it to Brazil and juxtapose Lil Ze’s brutal killings with gorgeous photography of Rocket and his friends on one of Rio’s famous beaches. An American viewer is likely to be fascinated by this exotic land that they know little about, but the filmmakers can effectively exploit that ignorance by usurping Rio de Janeiro’s postcard image, and expose the crime and poverty that permeates the city.

As Robert Stam points out in Tropical Multiculturalism, Brazil and America are very similar in terms of their historical formation. Brazil has always seemed very familiar and yet alien at the same time to Americans (Tropical Multiculturalism 1). That is a feeling that a viewer may have when watching City of God. The way the film is shot, written, and scored seems very familiar and strange at the same time. Weighing all of these factors, this film would have stood a very good chance of being a major success in the United States if it had and American cast and the language spoken was English instead of Portuguese. The language spoken and the alien nature of the subject material were probably the only factors that kept City of God from being a truly big hit in the United States. Because of its usage of crime film conventions, and westernized production sensibilities this film was able to reach a much larger audience than a typical Brazilian film. From its First World gaze, a Western audience is able to feel superior to the people that they are viewing onscreen. Notions of superiority are backed up when we see the people that inhabit the slums of Rio de Janeiro murdering each with intervention from a corrupt police force. The reinforcement of Western stereotypes about Third World citizens keeps City of God from being revolutionary in the sense that Third Cinema’s forefathers would have envisioned. Meirelles and Lund do not completely betray the philosophies of the films that set the precedent for Latin American and Third World filmmaking as City of God has moments that are specifically designed to make the viewer uneasy and agitated. It seems through this strategy that they furthering the legacy of Third Cinema by branching out to a more widespread Western audience by being quietly subversive. Meirelles and Lund’s divergence from Third Cinema conventions could just be the next step in its evolution.







Works Cited
Stam, Robert and Louise Spence. “Colonialism, Racism, and Representation: An Introduction.” Published in Film Theory and Criticism Sixth Edition. Braudy, Leo and Cohen, Marshall. New York: Oxford University Press, 2004.
Stam, Robert. Film Theory: An Introduction. Malden MA: Blackwell Publishing, 2000.
Stam, Robert. Tropical Multiculturalism: A Comparative History of Race in Brazilian Cinema and Culture. Durham: Duke University Press, 1997.