[Review] City of God

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Well, it's certainly creatively shot. And very well made. And terribly violent and bleak and depressing, and I don't think I've SEEN a movie with quite as many guns, and they're forever going off.

The picture that the movie is trying to paint, though, is one that jaded moviegoers (and jaded humans) have seen or heard about far too often, both in the theaters and in the newspapers.

Gangs pop up in poverty situations. The guy who none of the girls like channels his narcissistic rage into brutality and becomes the hated gang leader, while the good guy, his family torn apart by said gang leader, seeks to take his revenge, but eventually gets seduced by the gang mentality and becomes what he once hated, yadda yadda...

So, there you go. NOT, as Roger Ebert said, the greatest movie of 2003. But not bad.

Three out of four stars.