city of god essay

1. City of God Essay
In this essay I will be analysing the beginning of the movie, City of God, I will
be including things such as; mise en scene, editing and camera movement and
shottypes.
The beginning of City of God begins with a montage of knives being
sharpened, this is an enigma code as the audience do not know why they are
being sharpened and whatthey will be used for. Itthen involves chickens into
the montage, this tells the audience that they are killing the chickens with the
knives. The chicken’s feet are mixed with the human feet which creates a
contrastof the two, it shows thehumans dancing and having fun whilstthe
chickens are walking their last steps. This contrastalso shows a binary
opposition of the human’s life vs the chicken’s death. The opening also
includes diegetic sounds such as the knives being sharpened on the rocks, also
the chicken’s clucking and the human’s laughing, talking etc. the music is
playing throughoutthe intro however as soon as the bowl full of blood is in
shotthe music dead stops, this is an action code as the audience see that the
chickens are being killed. The mise en scene means that the setting is very
clear to the audience straight away, this is because there is Brazilian samba
music in the background whilstshowing shots of the favela.
The main thug, little Ze has a lot of low angle shots of him, these camera
shots show he has power and makes him look bigger and more powerfulthan
everyoneelse. There is also a canted shot wherethe camera is slanted to an
angle, this shows thecharacters madness and insanity to the audience. The
firsttime the movie involves context is fromZe, to increaseemphasis on the
firstbit of dialogue they had an extreme closeup on Ze’s face. Once the main
character, Rocket comes into the movie for the first time, there is a unique
shotof all the bad characters surrounding Ze. This once again shows hehas the
control and respect of them. Itthen pans to Rocket with the police surrounding
him in the background. This shows thateven though he was justtrying to help
and get the chicken all of the cops werethere for the thugs but Rocket can get
involved in all of the action justbecause he was there. This shows thatthe area

2. in which they live is harsh for everyonewho lives there, even if they arenot
involved in whatis going on.
When the chicken breaks freeand runs away it starts with a low angle shot of
everyonejumping down into the streets. When everyonejumps down it goes
fromhappy, joyfulmusic to a fastpaced and intense tune. Itthen converts into
a bird’s eye view of everyone running down the favela. This creates tension for
the audience as they get to see everyone running frantically through the
favela. WhilstRocket is talking he mentions Ze and how he wants to avoid him,
this creates irony for the audience as they then see Ze walking down the street
towards Rocketslowly. Itthen spins around and turns back in time to the
sixties. This is a creative and unique camera shot type as it converts fromthe
present day to the pastthrough spinning. Itthen shows kids playing football, as
we know its set in Brazil already; this is relevant as they are always playing
football in Brazil.
The opening of City of God contains a lot of different shot types and unique
editing styles. Itis a strong opening and gives the audience a lot to think about
in terms of the characters and whatcould happen throughoutthe story.
There’s also a lot of moments wherethe audience can think about what
happened if the producer did something different and altered the scenario.