Search - Carandiru on DVD

IVOR I. from CHICAGO, IL
Reviewed on 2/8/2011...

A good movie, although the filmmmaker, Hector Babenco, the writer director of the pristine story of a barely adolescent street criminal 'Pixote,'has played fast and loose with the true facts portrayed with a sort of documentary feel here. This is the story of a riot which broke out at the Sao Paolo House of Detention in Carandiru, Brazil. When it was over, 111 prisoners were dead, killed by riot police who stormed the prison.

For almost two hour hours, Babenco focuses on the lives of the prisoners, as seen through the eyes of the doctor whose book served as the basis for the film. Dr. Drauzio Varella, who has been sent to help discourage the spread of AIDS. The men tell him stories about how they ended up being incarcerated for which there are many flashback sequences). The prison is shockingly overcrowded and drug use and disease run rampant , but the men are treated well Prisoners have have the freedom to walk around and interact with one another .

But all that changes in the last half hour of the film after a riot begins and the prisoners are basically massacred in cold blood for the sin of challenging the system. Argentine writer/director Hector Babenco (along with co-authors Fernando Bonassi and Victor Navas) avoids the usual tendencies for good-vs-bad. The violence that the prisoners perpetrate on their victims and each other are conveyed by the filmmaker with a dispassionate efficiency and awe-inspiring swiftness that are indeed chilling.

As a drama, "Carandiru" overbusies itself in the boring details of prison life, but, really, the utter jadedness of both the prisoners and their guards, but that is the point. Babenco certainly draws the characters well for the viewer.

The film boasts an extraordinary ensemble cast, who offer many moments of levity. It's certainly my favorite prison movie.

An Epic Film of Monumental Importance!

Grady Harp | Los Angeles, CA United States | 09/22/2004

(5 out of 5 stars)

"CARANDIRU is in every sense of the term an Epic film: based on a novel by a physician who wrote of his experiences in the largest prison in South America (Carandiru housed 7000 inmates in Sao Paulo, Brazil before its implosion in 2002), it documents the barely known Carandiru Massacre of 1992; it examines the individual lives, psyches, and social behaviors of prisoners in a vastly more comprehensive manner than any other film about prisons; it captures on film the squalor and tragedy and even comedy of a segregated male population who must find a means to live despite the deprivation of prison life. Hector Babenco ('Pixote', 'Kiss of the Spider Woman', etc) has written a screenplay based on the novel 'Esatacao Carandiru' by Drauzio Varella, the physician who was drawn into the drama of Carandiru after his initial academic foray into gathering blood samples from the prisoners for his work on the epidemiology of AIDS. As portrayed with great tenderness by Luis Carlos Vasconcelos, the doctor becomes father confessor to the men within the squalid walls of Carandiru, gradually unveiling the secret pasts of the prisoners - their backgrounds, their reasons for incarceration, their modes of behavioral adaptation to life in the vast structures of Carandiru. Babenco has cast this enormous crew of prisoners with actors who are so fine that they offer some of the finest character cameos on film: Ivan de Almeida ('Ebony') is the prisoner gatekeeper who wisely controls the comings and goings of the men; Lazaro Ramos ('Ezequiel') is but one of the drug addicts whose dependence on drugs is far from his pre-prison life as a well-known surfer; Caio Blat ('Deusdete') and Wagner Maura ('Zico') grew up as orphaned brothers only to be joined later by separate crimes as roommates in Carandiru; Milton Goncalves ('Chico') provides the doctor with first-class medical assistance while falling in love with ( and marrying) 'Lady Di' (in a breakthrough role of the gifted actor Rodrigo Santoro, whose roles in 'The Roman Spring of Mrs. Stone', 'Behind the Sun', and even 'Charlie's Angels - Full Throttle' show promise of a very important screen presence), and many, many more. The cast includes both female and male actors (Carandiru has visiting days when families can see the prisoners) and without exception, each role is etched into the canvas that is Carandiru in an extraordinary fashion. The point of the film seems to be a prelude to the last thirty minutes that very graphically depicts the riot and massacre of 111 prisoners by the prison's riot squad. But it is the scope of humanity examined by Babenco that creates our identification with the victims and survivors of this tragedy. Extra features on the DVD include deleted scenes, each of which is so fine that it seems a shame they landed on the cutting room floor, and a series of scenes being filmed showing Babenco in action as a director - certainly some of the more tender interactions between directors and actors on film as well as an insight into the way in which directors communicate their vision (and achieve it) through the filming process. There are also interviews with author Varella who has important asides about the adaptation of his book

The musical score is hauntingly appropriate, the camera work is some of the best you'll see in today's cinema, and the overall effect after the film is over is one of awe and respect for the director and the actors and the indictment of prison life to which we rarely have access. A brilliant motion picture, worth more than Five Stars!"

Stark, engrossing portrayal of life in a notorious Brazilian

RaabH | USA | 10/09/2006

(4 out of 5 stars)

"This is much more than a prison riot film. In fact, the entire first two hours are spent exploring the lives and back stories of a select group of prisoners. Using a technique that will be familiar to viewers of the HBO series "Oz", we follow each of the prisoners in flashback through the series of events that led to their imprisonment. We also come to know what level of status (or lack of it) they each hold within the prison pecking order.

The result is for the most part a detailed portrait of daily life at Carandiru -- rivalries, loyalties, fights, love affairs, drug abuse, and murder -- along with a portrayal of the warden and his staff that is unexpectedly sympathetic.

It is worth noting that, while the conditions inside are certainly filthy and deplorable, the prisoners enjoy a surprising amount of freedom compared to similar facilities in the States. What surprised me most is a "family day" that is held each year where parents, wives, girlfriends, and children come to mingle throughout the facility with their jailed loved ones. Families picnic together and couples enjoy conjugal visits.

When the riot eventually does break out, it is not simply because the prisoners are rebelling against the poor conditions .. it is also because of one or more events that take place. (Nobody is quite capable of saying exactly which event or combination of them.) What is far more clear is the brutality shown by the police riot squad as it takes control of the facility once the prisoners have surrendered their weapons. Blood literally runs through the hallways and down the stairwells. Having come to know many of the prisoners as people makes these scenes very difficult to watch.

Overall this is an excellent movie, although anyone expecting 2-1/2 hours of hostage-taking and violence will be disappointed by its insistence on first taking the measure of the prisoners' humanity."

Deliberate reflection upon injustice in Brazilian prison...

Kim Anehall | Chicago, IL USA | 11/11/2004

(4 out of 5 stars)

"In Sao Paolo, Brazil, there used to be a prison named Carandiru, which was torn down in 2002. Despite the fact that the Carandiru prison no longer exists, its haunting history cannot escape the audience. It is through Hector Babenco's direction the audience can view the brutality that took place an October day in 1992 when 300 police officers massacred 111 inmates. This dramatization is based on true events, and it is told through the testimony of a physician who worked in the prison before the riots lead to the carnage.

The story follows Dr. Varella who arrives to the prison to investigate AIDS and HIV, which was a rather new disease at the time. Through Dr. Varella the audience gets to meet a number of characters with diverse pasts, and how they ended up in Carandiru. Most of them are criminals in one way or another, however, their stories bring humanity to the dire prison. The stories depict the convicts' feelings and their lives in the prison as they have to adjust to the life in the overcrowded penitentiary. It is the struggle for an ordinary life in the jail that becomes the focus of the film, which also enhances the revolting behavior of the police force.

The depicted humanity magnifies the violence that is brought to the Carandiru through the 300 police officers that stormed the jail with assault rifles. This is reinforced through survivors of the bloody assault as they sit in on interviews in which they disclose their feeling in regards to what happened. However, Babenco does not reach the same level with Carandiru as he did with Pixote when it was released in the early 80s. The main reason is that the film feels somewhat staged as some scenes become slightly awkward unlike the rough depiction of Pixote. Regardless of having a staged atmosphere Carandiru offers a terrific cinematic experience, which will offer deliberate reflection upon injustice as the police force was not charged for anything after having murdered 111 inmates of Carandiru.
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