The document provides a detailed summary of scenes set in an apartment in the City of God film. It describes the changing appearance and occupants of the apartment throughout the film as different gang members rise to power and take control. The narrative is told through a series of dissolves showing the apartment becoming more run-down. Eventually, Little Ze takes over and threatens Blacky at gunpoint, mirroring how the apartment's control has changed hands multiple times.

1. City of God
The Story of the Apartment

2. • Rocket is on the beach and offers to get Angelica a joint – series
of cuts – the Apartment: narrow streets, low shacks with tin
roofs, apartment blocks in background (cf US gangster films –
gangster starts at the bottom and on street level and works his
way to the top, which is often a high rise apartment). Streets are
empty save for a dog – warm yellow colour giving way to darker
blue/grey shades. Shots down narrow alleyways. Whip pans are
used to show his progress; Handheld/Steadicam shots, street
level with Rocket in ELS. Vertical wipe and whip pan – ELS to
MLS. High shots tilts down as he talks of going to the top dogs.
Low angle looks up between apartments – claustrophobic but
seen from low point – where he is.
• Samba music – a short cut to help create verisimilitude and a
sense of location
• Cut to dark corridor LS red walls (danger); paint peeling
(neglected) Cut to LS Rocket from behind – darker mise-en-
scene; narrow, little light, waffle-pattern windows let little light
in – confined space – descends steps to enter apartment –
connotations of descent into hell.

3. • Cut – interior shot – Blacky opens door after checking
through window – a school friend for whom life has
taken a different path. Asks – “How are things down
there?”
• Apartment – living room with some furniture; paint-
daubed walls. Small windows; dirty tiled bricks; fridge
without a door stocked with beer – not a glamorous
penthouse. Steadicam movement underlines nervy
situation especially after banging on the door – cut to
MCU Rocket as he turns to door. Cut to Blacky as he
goes past Rocket to grab gun. Cut to MS as Rocket
stands behind Black who points gun at door – people
living on edge all the time. See toilet between them –
dirty looking with wine glass on sink. Blacky’s colleague
opens door and cut to wide LS in deep focus from
which story of apartment will be told – contrast to
most of the film where the camera is highly mobile.
Wide angle and eep focus makes figures appear larger
in foreground and small in background. Story is told
with a series of dissolves where people appear,
disappear and reappear in different parts of the room.
As the times passes, colours change and furniture
moves – a series of tableaux – like Victorian moral
paintings such as Past and Present – sometimes double
images where characters are seen simultaneously in
different parts of the room – Renaissance paintings
(e,g, Adoration of the Magi).

4. • Little Ze enters and threatens Black by asking him,
“Who said it was your place?” image freezes as
Blacky rises to face Ze.
• Note title on screen as if this is another story
within the main narrative.
• Rocket is our narrator – begins with a dissolve to
a more homely apartment – warmer colours – the
narration is outside the narrative at this point but
tells us the place belonged to a drug dealer,
Donna Zelia, who sold drugs to raise her daughters
– she fades in and out. Left of screen, image of
Donna and Big Boy in the bed room fades out
while on the right, an image fades in as he attacks
her – takes over by force and destroys the
‘domestic’ look by pulling the table cloth off the
table. Image fades out as another MCU of Big Boy
sitting and dealing drugs replaces him – the mise-
en-scene changes to look more rundown. Dirtier
paintwork, porn pictures in the wall…
• Introduces Carrot, who will play a bigger part in
the story
• Another dissolve and Carrot is dealing in Big Boy’s
chair and Blacky working for him – note knife and
gun on table – threat of violence is constant
• Note the term, ‘manager’ – drugs seen as a
business – a way of moving up in society

5. • Another dissolve – Blacky is in chair and Carrot talks to
Aristotle – apartment is more run down – dirtier, paint
peeling, most of the furniture has gone. Note the dissolves
within this narrative as when Carrot sits next to Aristotle or
when he gets out his seat
• Another dissolve Big Boy looms at the left – Carrot is sitting
and then the dissolve completes and he’s at the right. Both
characters are too close to the camera for their heads to fit
– there’s no tilt: the camera remains fixed. Lighting is low to
suggest sense of foreboding
• Another dissolve – Aristotle enters at left as Big Boy fades
out. Carrot is on right, looking down because he knows he
has to kill him. Carrot fades out properly and then in
pointing a gun at Aristotle
• He shoots and fades but the body of Aristotle lies on the
floor. The lighting is low and the mise-en-scene has grown
dark and shadowy.
• Aristotle fades and cops burst through the door; another
dissolve and cops bring Big Boy out the bedroom
• Another dissolve – Carrot is in charge and Blacky and others
work for him – apartment looks dirtier – Carrot gives the
apartment to Blacky because he feels it is ill-fated – ‘took
over the local trade’.

6. • Dissolve – Rocket (white shirt marks him out as the schoolboy he is
and a comparative innocent) – apartment is dirtier, blue paint
smeared on the wall; grimy tiles in toilet at the right. Story has come
full circle –though it isn’t shot the way we first saw it. Knock on the
door – first proper cut in this scene as Blacky pulls Rocket over to
the side of the room while getting his gun – Use of Steadicam makes
the movement and atmosphere edgier – follows Blacky to the table
while Ze enters in MS this time – more threatening. Cut to close
shot of gun pointed at camera which is just behind head and arm of
victim; low lit scene. Camera tilts to show grinning gang member
looking to Ze. Cut to feet of victims and whip pan up body MS to
show them afraid with hands raised – completely defenceless. Cut
to Blacky MCU nervous – tries to move out the frame cut to Ze –
walks towards Blacky, threatening, tells him he’s not Little Dice but
Little Ze. Walks closer; sweating face makes him look more evil –
title: The Story of Little Ze and burst of music; image freezes and
camera closes in – grahic match – dissolve from face to his face
when he was younger, outside motel – another flashback that will
bring us full circle back to the apartment – narrated by Rocket –
telling us things he wasn’t witness to. Low shot. Close up; head
tilted to show attitude; surrounded by darkness – low-lit shot and
he’s shot with railings behind him – trapped by circumstances and
ambition and a foreshadowing of his fate. Bright motel lights flash
behind him on the left, but he turns away and looks into the
darkness