Nov 13, 2008

City of God (2002): C

It wasn't so long ago that the name Fernando Meirelles was synonymous not with overreaching arthouse pomposity, but the unbridled ambitions of new talent. City of God has always been overrated, but watching the film again suggests that such unchecked praise may have actually been the tipping point of the director's downfall. With a superficial adherence to the GoodFellas formula pandering to fanboys and critics, many mistook his stylistic distinction for aesthetic profundity, and Meirelles's style quickly became its own form of content, as The Constant Gardener superficially shuffled the same look, now heightened, into an altogether inappropriate narrative setting. Here, the mania of the Meirelles look - overexposed colors and jittery, caffeinated camerawork - is hit-or-miss in its evocation of ghetto life, often masterful in its distillation of exposition into pure sight and sound energy (particularly the tragic sequence at a dance party) but equally frustrating in its overall lack of narrative focus. Similarly problematic is the use of the protagonist Rocket's (Alexandre Rodrigues) narration to tell the story; as one of the few individuals to grow up in the film's Rio de Janeiro slums without being accosted by the local hoodlum culture, his relationship to the central conflicts remains minor and incidental while his own story remains largely unexplored and forgotten, thus exposing his thinly veiled role as a screenwriting device. Such a role feels even more disingenuous as the film's violence borderlines on exploitation, as such Pulp Fiction-reminiscent flashes function less to booth the audience's adrenaline than to diminish the gravity of portrayed suffering. The visceral and artistic excitement remains on surface-bound, where City of God remains a film of impressive, if superfluous, accomplishments.

7 comments:

  1. I just saw this movie a month ago and yeah, overrated is definitely the word. Good enough that it deserves the worldwide distribution it got, but not exactly an instant classic. FM really needs to find a new cinematographer, the look for City of God was perfect because it resembled Kodachrome, a perfect way to tie into the whole photography aspect of the film (which, agreed, feels tacked on and only used a segue when nothing interesting was happening to the main characters). That style has no place or purpose in Constant Gardner, and I haven't seen Blindness but the cinematography in the trailers looked the same too. Really, City of God's greatest strength was all the little moments and flourishes that gave you some instant insight into the character's personalities and mentalities. Forget these grand, broad theme "hyperlink" films, I'd love to see what FM could do with a movie focusing on just one person.

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  2. I miss frequent updates....

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  3. Anonymous7:25 PM

    City of God isn't just overrated - it's a vacuous 'naturalistic' GoodFellas wannabe bomb that lacks a shred of volatility or interest despite all the guns blazing, most notably where all the forgettable characters and performances on display are concerned, so I pretty much despise it.

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  4. Anonymous2:19 AM

    Loved it and it's now my favourite film. Masterpiece.. I don't get the two comments up there...

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  5. Anonymous2:26 AM

    Loved the film. It's a masterpiece. My new favourite movie now.. I don't get the hate. I've never watched GoodFellas before but the Director in my opinion is a genius.. It was insanely artistic and innovative directing. Maybe it was hyped up too much for you guys if you thought it was "overrated".

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  6. Anonymous5:46 AM

    Are you kidding me? This movie was incredible! A screenwriting device? Come on, I think someone is looking too hard for flaws and trying to be different from the other critics.

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  7. Anonymous5:28 AM

    i thought much of the movie was discombobulated and jittery. I had a hard time caring for the characters portrayed in the the film. They often felt distant and hidden behind fancy camera work. the film was souless, a pretty husk of visual artwork lost in its own granduer and overbloadted cast. the themes addressed in the film were to broad to be cared about, and emotional sincerity was often hard to find.

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