City of God

I just watched an unbelievable movie called City of God. City of God is the name given to a housing project built in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil in the 1960’s. By the 80’s the entire district was over-run by gangs who turned the streets into their own personal war zone. The entire story is told through the eyes of a, now famous, photographer who grew up there. Many parts are extremely hard to stomach. Small children, or “runts” as they were lovingly called, were recruited by the gangs to run drug errands and in some cases, kill other children. It was amazing how realistic the movie seemed, the acting was so totally flawless that at times I felt like I was watching a documentary and that the violence I was seeing was happening for real right before my eyes. The subject matter of the movie obviously left me feeling pretty depressed at the end, but it was still, just an excellent movie. Not that I like things that make me depressed, I just like good movies that make me think and not that I necessarily like to think about depressing stuff…ok..I’m gonna stop here before I spin myself in circles. You know what I mean.