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TARGET AUDIENCE - JungleDrums starts film club to delve into harsh realities

JungleDrums starts film club to delve into harsh realities

See more on our special page Jungle Cineclub...

Success against all odds, that's probably the best way to describe what the Brasilian film Elite Squad (by José Padilha) achieved in the last edition of the 58th Berlinale, the largest film festival in the world. It scooped the highest prize of the event, the Golden Bear for best film, leaving behind the favourites There will be Violence (P.T. Anderson) and British Happy-go-Lucky (Mike Leigh). Padilha's piece is a semi-fictional account of the extreme methods utilised by a special police force in Rio known as BOPE, and it drew a lot of criticism from some of the international media for its crude depiction of violence.

The American magazine Variety called it “a recruitment fi lm for fascist thugs”. Others accused it of crudely emulating violence in mainstream American cinema, such as Tarantino's fi lms. All of these critics failed to recognise that the violence depicted in Brasilian cinema is based on everyday, real
life events, and that it has social causes - as opposed to Tarantino's films, which are a by-product of the director's imagination.

Other recent films such as City of God (Fernando Meirelles) and Bus 174 (by Padilha himself) also accurately depicted the sad, violent reality of Brasil and the vulnerability of its citizens. Both are part of the selection for Jungle CineClub.

Glauber Rocha dealt with the same theme four decades ago in Black God, White Devil, one of the most influential Brasilian films of all times. According to Rocha, “violence is the most genuine cultural manifestation of hunger”. International critics who slammed Elite Squad probably wrote their reviews on a empty stomach. JD

Words: Victor Fraga

P.S - FOR THE LAUNCH OF JUNGLE'S CINECLUB,
a monthly night that’ll showcase the best of Brasilian cinema at Bethnal Green’s Rich Mix.

Rich Mix
35-47 Bethnal Green Road - London E1 6LA
020 7613 7490