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MOVIES / ON DVD / CITY OF MEN
City of Men

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City of Men (2008)

77%
100%
72%
N/A
N/A
N/A
77 %
Reviews Counted: 64 Fresh: 49  Rotten:15 Average Rating: 6.7/10
 
Consensus: A touching tale of youths coming of age in Rio's harsh favelas. Brutal and unflinching, City of Men is both a harrowing look at Brazil's favela life, and a touching tale of youths rushed into adulthood. more
 
Runtime: 1 hr 50 mins
Synopsis:
Director Fernando Meirelles scored an unexpected hit with his disquieting 2003 feature CITY OF GOD. Subsequent years saw plenty of similar fare emerging from Brazil, and Meirelles even lent a hand by contributing to the hit TV show CITY OF MEN. This big-screen adaptation of the show follows... [More]
Director Fernando Meirelles scored an unexpected hit with his disquieting 2003 feature CITY OF GOD. Subsequent years saw plenty of similar fare emerging from Brazil, and Meirelles even lent a hand by contributing to the hit TV show CITY OF MEN. This big-screen adaptation of the show follows its two central characters, best friends Ace (Douglas Silva) and Wallace (Darlan Cunha), as they are unwittingly caught up in a vicious gang war in their dilapidated favela. Ace struggles with his newfound responsibilities as a young father while Wallace searches for his errant father. Meanwhile, a brutal turf war breaks out around them, and Ace is reluctantly swept up into one of the gangs after threats on his life leave him with little choice but to join in the mayhem. Paulo Morelli's film is a pacy, bloody thriller that pays warm tribute to a diverse cross-section of American directors including Quentin Tarantino and Michael Bay. Bullets zing across the screen, heavy artillery is deployed at all times, and Morelli makes great use of the twisty favela streets during some frantic chase sequence. Silva and Cunha, who both had roles in CITY OF GOD, carry the picture with impressive ease, and while CITY OF MEN isn't an official sequel to Meirelles's lauded picture, it does serve as a neat continuation of that film's unshakable portrayal of the violence that has beset so many young lives in the slums of Rio de Janeiro. [Less]

Genre: Foreign Films

Starring: Darlan Cunha, Douglas Silva, Jonathan Haagensen, Rodrigo Dos Santos, Camila Monteiro

Director: Paulo Morelli
Screenwriter: Elena Soarez
Story: Paulo Morelli, Elena Soarez
Producer: Andrea Barata Ribeiro, Bel Berlinck, Fernando Meirelles, Paulo Morelli
Composer: Antonio Pinto

DVD Info

Release:

Jan 7, 2008

[DVD Details]

DVD Features:

  • Region 1
  • Keep Case
  • Anamorphic Widescreen - 1.85

Audio:

  • Dolby Digital 5.1 Surround - Portuguese
  • Subtitles - English, French, Spanish - Optional

Additional Release Material:

  • Featurette - Building a City of Men

Reviews

 
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1 - 20 (sorted by date; UK critics are listed first)
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Ratings Image

This film isn't as bracingly vibrant as Fernando Meirelles' City of God (2002), which featured many of the same cast and crew. But it's a grippingly entertaining story.

Full Review | Comment
02/28/08 11:01 AM
Rich Cline
Shadows on the Wall
Ratings Image

More bronzed bodies bearing arms leading to inevitable shootouts delivered via a washed-out, hand-held digital style pulsing along to an infectious Latin beat.

Full Review | Comment
04/02/08 03:15 AM
David N. Butterworth
rec.arts.movies.reviews
Ratings Image

The film's overriding message that love and friendship exist under the most hopeless of circumstances is what makes City of Men such a worthy, compelling drama.

Full Review | Comment
03/26/08 09:55 AM
Ken Hanke
Mountain Xpress (Asheville, NC)
Ratings Image

Click to read the article

Full Review | Comment
03/25/08 03:15 AM
Film Threat
Ratings Image

[One] plotline ends with a twist that doubtless felt more authentic in the halls of a film school than it would on the streets of Rio de Janeiro.

Full Review | Comment
03/16/08 10:23 AM
Matt Brunson
Creative Loafing
Ratings Image

It plays like a Western, and the violence, while plentiful and visceral, rarely has the kind of raw impact you want in a movie such as this. Morelli keeps most of the blood off-camera.

Full Review | Comment
03/14/08 02:45 PM
Roger Moore
Orlando Sentinel
Ratings Image

...not a sequel to City of God, although it sometimes feels like a junior-varsity version of the older movie.

Full Review | Comment
03/14/08 05:02 AM
Philip Martin
Arkansas Democrat-Gazette
Ratings Image

An efficient, simply told story...in spite of the plot's neat contrivances and the movie's determination to pull some edifying nugget from the heartbreak and hopelessness at its core.

Full Review | Comment
03/12/08 06:45 AM
Thomas Peyser
Style Weekly (Richmond, VA)
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[It has] a real ring of authenticity in every scene.

Full Review | Comment
03/10/08 09:58 AM
Richard Roeper
Ebert & Roeper
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Morelli's film is most effective at its most documentarian, when it focuses on street detail and the casual, everyday behavior of the people inside the desperate favelas.

Full Review | Comment
03/07/08 08:45 AM
John Beifuss
Commercial Appeal (Memphis, TN)
Ratings Image

May mean well, but its soapy plot and comparatively flabby execution make for a surprisingly tepid combination.

Full Review | Comment
03/02/08 02:02 PM
Frank Swietek
One Guy's Opinion
Ratings Image

What becomes interesting is how Ace and Wallace, who have managed to stay outside the violence for the most part, start to get pulled in once they uncover information about their fathers.

Full Review | Comment
03/01/08 05:30 PM
Beth Accomando
KPBS.org
Ratings Image

City of Men, in Portuguese with subtitles, never quite achieves the dramatic impact of the Oscar-nominated drama that inspired it.

Full Review | Comment
03/01/08 12:17 PM
Larry Ratliff
San Antonio Express-News
Ratings Image

City of Men is an intriguing but incompletely developed heir to the far superior City of God.

Full Review | Comment
02/29/08 01:52 PM
Marjorie Baumgarten
Austin Chronicle
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There isn't enough heft to the protagonists. City of Men tries to flesh out the victims of harsh favela life, but too often they register as scurrying figures in a human ant farm.

Full Review | Comment
02/29/08 01:50 PM
Michael Sragow
Baltimore Sun
Ratings Image

Where City of God was ferocious, grandiose, and glamorous, this movie is modest and intimate, acoustic where the other was desperate to electrify.

Full Review | Comment
02/29/08 01:46 PM
Wesley Morris
Boston Globe
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I wish I hadn't seen the masterpiece City of God before the current City of Men, which is a more conventional story in the same setting. Judged on its own merits, the latter film still makes a considerable emotional impact.

Full Review | Comment
02/29/08 01:44 PM
Lawrence Toppman
Charlotte Observer
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The story might have been lifted from an old Warner Brothers melodrama, though it's smartly paced, sincerely delivered, and consistently absorbing.

Full Review | Comment
02/29/08 01:40 PM
J. R. Jones
Chicago Reader
Ratings Image

Along comes a sequel of sorts, City of Men, but the difference is clear right from the first frame: Meirelles is gone and so is the intensity. What's left is a mix of credible sociology and tired melodrama, along with a palpable sense of déjà vu.

Full Review | Comment
02/29/08 01:37 PM
Rick Groen
Globe and Mail
Ratings Image

City of Men at times seems like City of God-lite, which, mind you, still provides for some heavy moments.

Full Review | Comment
02/29/08 01:32 PM
Jim Slotek
Jam! Movies
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