Tropa de elite
Brazil
2007
Rio de Janeiro in 1997. Police officer Nascimento is in charge of an elite commando unit. He finds himself in a quandary when he is assigned to lead a rapid response force that has been given the task, on barest of pretexts, of maintaining law and order in a favela ruled by drug dealers. Unable to come up with a suitable successor for his job, he has no choice but to carry out the assignment himself. The fact that his wife Rosane is about to give birth to their first child and pleads with him every day to stop putting his life on the line, doesn’t make things any easier. This double burden weighing on Nascimento only makes him feel the pressure more keenly. In the midst of his predicament he receives an emergency call. There has been a shoot-out at a party in another favela and Nascimento and his group rush to the aid of two young policemen. The two young cops are so impressed by the professional way in which Nascimento’s squad help them to break free, that the pair – Neto and Matias – immediately sign up as trainees in the elite commando. The commitment of these two young men is soon on everyone’s lips. One of them is well-known for his daring, and the other for his intelligence. If Nascimento could only manage to forge these two qualities in one person then he would have found his successor.
An unapologetic take on the police-favela dynamics, and the story of an inevitable transformation.
How much does Tropa de Elite owe to Cidade de Deus? Much. But where Meirelles paints a saga… read review
This is the kind of film that you can’t really just see and let go. Its portrayal of the hardest part of Brazilian reality is haunting, especially for a Mexican like myself, who’s living in the middle… read review
Parra pa parra pa parra pa pa parra pa pa parra pa parra pa pao.
I can’t get the opening song out of my head. This movie is great entertainment. Like the squad in the movie the structure and… read review
Wow… I just came back from a Screening of this film in Tribeca and I must say this was one of the most shocking and haunting films I have seen in recently. I especially liked how the story is structured… read review