I'm Hector Babenco, the director of the movie Carandiru.
I am also one of the screenwriters...
...who wrote and adapted Drauzio Varella's book.
Since the beginning of the writing process...
...I had the pleasure of receiving faxed pages from Dr. Drauzio...
...which made me enthusiastic...
...to the point of investing a year and a half on the script.
Or more, two years.
The first scene did not exist in the script.
It began with a documentary, which didn't work...
...because it was too slow.
After Drauzio told me the story of a revolt he witnessed...
...we decided to use this idea, which wasn't in the book...
...and turn it into the beginning of the movie.
This huge shot of the city of São Paulo...
...was a satellite photograph.
An artist named Nuno Ramos came up with the idea.
He took photos from the satellite at the time of the massacre...
...and we magnified the photo.
Here, we open with the revolt Drauzio told me about.
He had gone there to conduct routine medical exams...
...and stumbled upon a dilemma in which a man tried to kill...
...another inmate, called Dagger...
...who had supposedly killed his father.
It is a scene reminiscent...
...of Greek tragedy in every imaginable sense.
The man we see here is Ebony...
...the head janitor, kitchen coordinator...
...and the person who maintains order inside the penitentiary.
Sort of an authority within the penitentiary...
...with more power and ability to command...
...than the director of the penitentiary.
He is the one who interacts with the inmates...
...making Solomonic decisions as to who is right or wrong...
...and what actions the community must take to live in harmony...
...so that the inmates remain alive...
...to continue their lives outside the penitentiary.
It's important to remember that Carandiru is not a prison...
...but a detention center which, throughout the years...
...has deteriorated completely and become a penitentiary.
That is, the inmates at Carandiru are all awaiting trial.
They haven't been tried or condemned...
...and some have been there for more than 10 years.
Here we have the meeting between two authorities...
...Ebony, the head janitor...
...and the director of the penitentiary.
Behind him stands the doctor, who is on a routine visit.
These first eight or nine minutes are important...
...even though the scene is not in the book...
...because it establishes the rivalries...
...and the quality of relations among the inmates...
...in the opening moments of the movie...
...avoiding a treatment used in several scripts...
...which described the way the penitentiary worked...
...and who inhabited Pavilion 8, Pavilion 9, Pavilion 4...
We decided to condense this in a closed area called "yellow wing"...
...a floor where the inmates don't go outside to sunbathe.
They remain confined and protected by the community...
...to avoid personal retaliation inside the penitentiary.
This situation reveals a conflict of tragic dimensions...
...as well as a moment when both authorities confront each other.
The spectator, taken by surprise by a film that begins...
...in the midst of a transgression...
...perceives the quality of the universe...
...in which these people live.
All of them, one way or another, will be characters in the movie.
Now, there's a meeting where a truce is established.
A moment of peace and quiet among the inmates...
...in which the doctor is introduced...
...to the person who in fact runs the penitentiary...
...an authority without rank.
Immediately, we realize the authority this man has...
...over the director of the penitentiary.
He makes him turn around and says...
...that if the knife doesn't reappear...
...one inmate will be killed every day.
So we realize that this is a place that none of us...
...watching the DVD has ever visited.
The knife is returned to the director of the penitentiary...
...and unlike what would happen in any other prison film...
...it is returned to the inmate as property of his kitchen.
Here, a quick walk and an explanation about...
...the characters who inhabit this specific corridor.
The doctor is appalled at the absurd conditions they live in...
...but nobody dares to mingle with the rest of the community.
This is the moment in which we physically and geographically...
...present a pavilion, in this case, Pavilion 9...
...with its enclosed courtyard, with all kinds of activities...
...board games, capoeira...
...cards, idle talk, crafts.
In short, a moment of recreation.
Then there's a sharp cut to the doctor...
...who explains what he's come to do in this story.
He comments on the danger and fear of AIDS...
...which was widespread among the inmates...
...due to intravenous drug use with the same needle...
...and rampant sexual promiscuity.
Here we present another character, Chico...
...who is caught red-handed doing something forbidden...
...talking on the phone with his daughter...
...whom he says he hasn't spoken to in 15 years.
He proudly comments that his family...
...has never stepped into a police station...
...and that, despite being in jail his whole life...
...he has raised 18 honest children...
...and asks permission to see his daughter.
But he asks for an exception, that she visit him...
...on a day other than visiting day, which, at first, is denied.
Here, the doctor begins his daily routine.
It can be considered a dramatic continuity of the preceding scene...
...the same day or any other day.
One sees the inmates doing domestic chores...
...and the doctor looking for his infirmary...
...where he will begin conducting AIDS tests among the inmates.
Here, a folkloric character, a mobile peddler...
...a cripple that sells almost everything...
...gum, cigarettes, pot...
...candy, peanuts, shampoo.
And here, we introduce new characters...
...who will be important to our story...
...Antônio Carlos and Claudiomiro.
Here, another gallery of characters.
They each tell the doctor who they are...
...and say they've come for an AIDS test...
...of their own free will.
We use this dramatically to depict the gallery...
...and the social diversity that inhabits such a sinister place...
...which we know so little about...
...a penitentiary in the heart of São Paulo.
This is Bristles, who will appear several times...
...a man who is part of the cleaning staff...
...the group that controls the penitentiary...
...for the well-being of the community...
...even though sometimes they adopt attitudes...
...which we would have trouble accepting.
This is how they manage to live peacefully...
...and fulfill their dreams not only of being set free...
...but free and alive.
Here, a young man in the advanced stages of deterioration.
Obviously, an AIDS victim.
The infirmary we see here was built...
...inside an architectural project erected...
...at Vera Cruz Studios, in São Bernardo do Campo.
It's a reproduction, albeit reinvented...
...by the magical work of Clóvis Bueno...
...the movie's art director.
The purpose of this sequence is to show...
...a little of the human fauna, the characters that inhabit...
...this labyrinth, their attitudes, their personalities...
...their differences...
The man we see here is Sabotage.
Sabotage was murdered by someone who had sworn...
...to kill him in jail, and when he got out...
...during the editing of the movie, we heard he'd been found dead.
He was a loyal companion...
...a collaborator in several raps we wrote together...
...and was with us throughout most of the shooting.
Cutting from the blood collection...
...there's a time lapse, a dramatic cut showing...
...the end of the day, when one supposes...
...that all the inmates have returned to their cells.
But then we notice that the doctor...
...who is on his first day of work...
...doesn't know his way back to the street...
...and to his normal life.
The doctor doesn't visit...
...the penitentiary every day, even though this...
...is not explained very clearly in the movie.
And in his walk, we created an opportunity...
...to introduce the geographical space of Carandiru...
...totally re-created in the studio.
The corridor is 50 meters long...
...and has two shorter lateral corridors...
...with doors and cells.
It's a 2000-square-meter set...
...that took several months to design and build.
Here, the doctor's curiosity in looking inside a cell...
...and, for the first time, the spectator realizes...
...that unlike the solitary prisoner one imagines...
...there are 10 or 12 people sharing the same space...
...each one with his own TV, creating a deafening sound.
We see the doctor continuing down the corridor in search...
...of another exit.
He sees a lonely inmate cooking his food...
...who, by coincidence, is Clóvis Bueno...
...who asked to play this cameo role.
The doctor exits into the courtyard we saw previously...
...bustling with activity...
...and what he sees now are the inmates in their cells...
...a building that resembles a flophouse...
...where different qualities and temperatures of light...
...demonstrate different activities the prisoners are engaged in.
The doctor realizes the door is locked and he can't get out...
...which is ironic, since the guard doesn't know the doctor...
...and doesn't believe he is truly a doctor.
It's his first moment of fear inside the penitentiary...
...which is natural. It's a scene that was inspired...
...by my first experiences visiting Carandiru.
It is utterly petrifying to be alone there...
...because you never know who you might meet...
...and what kind of attitude they might have.
But he is rescued and leaves...
...and what had been a moment of fear of the unknown...
...is quelled by Ebony, asking him if he's coming back.
This is the first voice-over insert, the doctor's voice...
...describing the perplexity of what he's seen.
He shares with the viewer who he is, what he feels...
...and what he thinks.
Then we cut to a scene of him working...
...as he would in any clinic or hospital.
Here, the first narrative level of the film is developed...
...which is the inmates' stories...
...that occupy almost 50 percent of Drauzio Varella's book...
...and which we call "flashbacks"...
...or stories told and illustrated by the movie.
There's no preoccupation with the truth.
The story is told the way he wants it to be heard...
...and here, he tells what happened the day...
...he robbed a jewelry store.
They arrive at a shack on the outskirts of São Paulo...
...where they are going to split the loot from the robbery.
I was a little disappointed the day we shot this...
...at the Novo Mundo slum, near Guarulhos...
...when I saw that the jewelry we had gathered...
...to illustrate the scene was meager.
Here, we have a death by mistake.
In a moment of tension, Ebony...
...distracted by the presence of his son...
...from whom he wanted to conceal what they were doing...
...thought his partner was hiding a gun under his jacket.
Here's a second twist to the story.
He realizes that in fact, he had been set up.
He was going to be killed and the booty shared...
...between Santa Claus and the bald man.
Here, we see his nerve, his personality...
...obviously exerting his energy and power...
...over a fragile character, whom he easily disarms.
They get rid of the corpse to avoid being caught...
...and we return to the penitentiary...
...so as not to lose the story's narrative flow...
...and not to forget that all these stories throughout the movie...
...although the spectator doesn't know it yet...
...are presented in the infirmary...
...where the doctor conducts his practice.
He continues telling his story.
Gordo was somehow arrested and confessed...
...and now he is taken to the detention center...
...or to a police station. We see his wife and son...
...the boy we'd seen in the window...
...a character that will appear later in the film.
It's a film with many characters, more than 20...
...and all of them important.
It's not a movie with a lead actor and actress.
Here, a dialogue inside the patrol van which I like very much...
...in which the thieves comment on their situation.
Ebony is shattered, anguished...
...unable to accept the way things turned out.
Gordo apologizes for his weakness of character...
...and we coexist with characters...
...who are completely different from the people we know.
Here, a comical moment in the film...
...in which the inmates dug...
...a tunnel inside the chapel...
...which took them a long time to finish...
...and through which they intend to escape.
But an unexpected and tragicomical situation occurs.
As the men try to flee like rats, in dreadful conditions...
...through putrid sewage pipes, the unexpected happens...
...when Gordo gets stuck in the tunnel and can't move.
It was a delicate situation, for if I'd made it too comical...
...it might have looked pathetic, therefore...
...it is relatively realistic. The character can't move...
...and ends up yelling in despair for help.
He returns to the present, asks about his illness...
...which is stress, exhaustion, fatigue...
...and excessive responsibility.
Ebony gets his prescription, and life goes on.
We immediately switch to a lyrical sequence...
...where we see that character we'd seen in the director's office...
...and we realize that he is a balloon-maker...
...who kills time making paper balloons.
Many of them never reach the clouds.
And here, the presentation of a very irreverent character...
...a great actor, Rodrigo Santoro, playing a homosexual.
A character that would normally be repelled by most spectators...
...here is a delicate human being with a sexual preference...
...completely opposite of his natural gender.
Let's listen to him for a while, since he has unique things to say.
The first sequence we saw, in the yellow wing...
...was shot at the Hipódromo Penitentiary, an abandoned area...
...where many years ago I filmed Kiss of the Spider Woman.
And here, we're back at the studio.
Rodrigo, Luiz Carlos Vasconcelos, who plays the doctor...
...and Gero Camilo, a great actor from the Northeast...
...whose character has a funny nickname: "No Way."
Here, there's a cut and a time passage...
...and we introduce another character...
...a great actor, Caio Blat.
I kid around with him, saying he's our Montgomery Clift.
Many people might not remember or know Montgomery Clift...
...a great American actor from the 1950s and 1960s.
A very shy, very discrete, but amazingly powerful actor.
Even without dialogue, one sees that there's no room for him.
He's looking for a bed. It's also a good moment...
...to show life inside the penitentiary during the day...
...what goes on in the corridors, and the different groups...
...in existence inside the penitentiary.
Here, we see a black man with bleached hair...
...surfing a wave that's painted on the wall.
This is Ezequiel, who is obviously high on crack.
He's taken something.
And here, we reintroduce Dagger...
...whom we saw in the first sequences.
Obviously, time has passed, since he's unconfined.
Here, we understand there's a survival code in the penitentiary...
...which we didn't know.
Zico arrives...
...and surprisingly...
...we find out that Zico knows Deusdete.
They embrace like friends, like brothers...
...which, in fact, is what they are...
...albeit by adoption, something we'll understand later.
We move on to a new character, Highness...
...who is preparing some packages...
...which, from his attitude, we understand to be drugs...
...which he hides somewhere difficult to be found.
He is bitten by a rat, which leads him back to the infirmary.
There, we see Lula and No Way stitching him up...
...the orderly smoking crack.
It's a scene I find funny because it shows...
...that even though they are inmates...
...they feel fear like any human being...
...and pain like any other person.
Despite the cruelties they might have practiced outside...
...they are people like any other, with the same kinds of reactions.
This scene is interrupted by the arrival of the doctor...
...who realizes that Lula is smoking crack...
...while conducting a surgical procedure.
This sequence was shot on the outskirts of São Paulo...
...near Santo André. I loved the soccer field...
...the soil's color and especially that large tree...
...which helps to compose the first scene.
And we introduce Maria Luisa Mendonça...
...a great actress...
...who plays the part of an uptown girl...
...malicious, whimsical...
...and we see Highness' total lack of inhibition...
...his smile revealing that he's a lady-killer.
The sky was beautiful, stunning. Especially behind Maria Luisa.
Ten minutes later, there was a thunderstorm...
...and we had to shoot on two different days...
...to maintain the lighting continuity.
This car is a rarity, a model one doesn't find easily.
A two-tone Beetle.
Highness in action. An irreverent man...
...who doesn't hesitate to pull out a gun.
At the same time, he has a great comical vein.
He's a very spontaneous and talented new actor.
He was a samba-school dancer in São Paulo...
...and this was his first film.
Dalva is stunned.
And we return once again to the penitentiary...
...where he continues telling his story.
Then a sequence of him with the blond...
...when he meets another woman.
Highness' charm is astounding. He's extremely natural...
...and an excellent dancer.
Maria Luisa, too, is an excellent samba dancer...
...which was a great surprise to us.
So I inverted the characters.
Instead of having the black girl dancing...
...I chose the blond to avoid the cliché that only blacks can samba.
This is Rosirene, a diabolical woman...
...the kind any man would lose his family for.
A Brazilian actress who lives in Berlin...
...and works in theater and has lived there for 10 years.
And we see that Highness is immediately interested in her.
Her name is Aida Leiner. Her mother is a black woman...
...and her father, a German Jew.
Thus, her blue eyes and interesting complexion.
This is a beautiful location in Parí Alto.
A shack enhanced by Clóvis using aluminum sheets...
...giving it an interesting, low-class, Mardi gras touch.
He arrogantly tries to hit on her...
...and she, very aloof and sure of herself...
...doesn't seem eager to flirt with him.
Maria Luisa returns with blood in her eyes.
And Highness ends up defeated, looking like a fool...
...chasing his wife to make up with her.
And here, a location that was transformed...
...into a boarding house room.
Inside the Três Rios Studios, a huge room...
...with interesting corridors and a winding staircase...
...which will appear later in the film.
And once again, Clóvis' hand...
...and excellent photography by Walter Carvalho.
Very hard to shoot because there were lots of mirrors on the walls.
We had to be very careful not to reflect the camera.
In the background, you can see the mirrors.
This is under the elevated highway Minhocão.
The graffiti "Metrópolis" really exists.
There, we set up a scene with homeless people...
...and prostitutes offering their services.
Even though she admits to being his lover...
...she refuses to give up her financial independence...
...and the need to be a prostitute...
...to pay for her own expenses, refusing his help.
He doesn't like her answer and realizes...
...that she is drifting away from him.
We had a caravan of 20 cars driving around the street...
...to have constant and controlled traffic.
Now we see the cars...
...all of them production vehicles with lighting.
It took a whole night to shoot this scene...
...12 to 14 hours of work.
A very daring scene, with her asking him to bite her.
Not to make love to her, but to bite her...
...which apparently drives her crazy.
Next, we have a time passage.
And we see his second lover arriving at the room...
...and catching them sleeping together.
Obviously, she knows about his affair...
...because she comes armed with a bottle of alcohol...
...bent on setting them on fire.
The preparation of this fire was quite complicated.
We used techniques to keep the fire from burning the sheets...
...giving them four seconds to jump out of bed.
Here, we have a gas line to keep the flames burning...
...which was controlled by the local fire department...
...who assisted us with this.
Now a cut and a time passage, the police having been called...
...and we show the winding staircase I liked...
...and chose to close the sequence from the moment I saw it.
As I needed to localize and date the movie...
...which took place in 1992...
...I used the president at the time, the man we see on TV...
...the foreboding Fernando Collor de Mello.
Next, there's a scene in which two characters...
...are drugging themselves.
We return to Deusdete, whom we previously met...
...and we learn about another character in the story...
...a sister whom Zico asks about.
We realize that Zico's behavior is altered by the drugs...
...and from the look Deusdete gives him...
...we see a certain disdain, a certain reproach...
...a superior and humiliating attitude...
...before Zico's degradation.
And a conflict is established which, further on...
...will develop into a very difficult moment.
Here, a junkie comes along and proposes to trade...
...his only personal object, an old surfboard...
...to pay his debt and purchase more drugs.
And now, one of the most insane moments in the film.
Zico drinks the water he used to wash his syringes.
The chance of him having caught a disease is enormous.
A reminder that the doctor is not the lead character...
...even though he is the one who narrates the story.
In the book, the doctor is the first voice...
...but he doesn't have a dramatic role in the penitentiary.
Here, he is one of the characters, a listener...
...an observer of the drama that unfolds.
Here, a prisoner begs to be taken to the yellow wing.
He fears for his life because he raped someone...
...a crime considered abominable among the inmates.
Our first chance to see the penitentiary as a whole.
We introduce the geographical space...
...and the territory of Carandiru gradually.
Chico, who has been granted permission...
...to see his daughter, has prepared himself...
...as well as possible given his conditions.
He set up a tent with a carpet...
...two benches, a bottle of soda...
...and even a flower on the table.
But the horn blows. His daughter hasn't come...
...and he suffers a moment of deep disappointment.
This is the real penitentiary, not the studio.
These are the walls of Carandiru.
This was filmed in Pavilion 2 in January, 2002.
The guards are real guards.
This was also shot inside Pavilion 2...
...an accounting office we converted with a false wall...
...to create a door to a kind of dungeon...
...a replica of the ones found in other pavilions...
...but placed between two staircases.
The environment is very claustrophobic...
...and I wanted the door to open to a place with more light.
Here, we return to the Vera Cruz studio.
With Gero Camilo and Rodrigo Santoro.
It's a comical scene, I'd say...
...in which they confess to the doctor...
...their desire to engage in a serious relationship.
The doctor is surprised...
...and the scene works as an intermezzo...
...for the beginning of another story...
...the story of Deusdete and Zico.
This staircase was built for the movie and leads nowhere.
It opens into a patio, a hall...
...where there would be a nonexistent elevator.
The chain-link fence is very dramatic.
As the stairs lead nowhere, the actors had to squat...
...and take their positions against this scenographic wall.
The steps were made of concrete...
...and it is a replica of a real Carandiru staircase.
Here, our first flashback, which was shot at Parí.
It was great working with the children...
...who were very natural, very pleasant.
This was shot at the Interlagos Reservoir, in a deserted area.
I was interested in this bucolic atmosphere...
...still water, boats abandoned in the water...
...to give the impression that it was a common weekday.
Here, we have younger actors. Júlia, whom I discovered...
...in a spectacle staged by...
...the Celia Helena Performing Arts School.
Wagner Moura, who recently starred in Deus É Brasileiro...
...and promises to be one of the great actors of his generation.
Here, a funny situation.
Even in the middle of this huge reservoir...
...the water is no deeper than 3 feet...
...and they played as if they were somewhere deeper.
They're playing with inner tubes...
...something I used to do as a kid in Argentina.
Here, Deusdete is drowning in 3 feet of water.
This scene demonstrates...
...the strong brother and the weak one.
He takes care of him, and this...
...will establish a very strong bond between them...
...from the beginning, the first scene where they meet...
...and will develop throughout the story.
Here, Deusdete remains in the foreground...
...as a listener...
...and the narration occurs behind him.
His brother's posture is inquisitorial regarding Deusdete.
He says he was simply a drug trafficker...
...while Deusdete, despite his saintly looks, was a murderer.
At first, Deusdete was supposed to be listening to music...
...and pretending to be a disc jockey...
...but then we chose to have him working on a bike for more realism.
Here, we improvised a bathroom inside a room with props...
...a fake toilet and basin.
I was interested in this small corridor...
...which was to be her room.
The bathroom was in fact a bedroom transformed into a bathroom...
...with a plastic curtain and set decoration.
What's interesting about her character...
...is that the film ends without one knowing...
...if she was truly molested or not.
If she was simply offended.
And this is a dilemma that the film doesn't intend to clarify...
...since it is not about her.
It does, however, raise a doubt that will affect the brothers.
This is one of my favorite scenes in the film.
It was shot on a flagstone.
When we got there, it was raining hard...
...and all our equipment had to be covered with a plastic canopy.
We couldn't cancel because we were three days behind schedule...
...so we immediately set up this huge plastic canopy...
...to cover everything under an improvised tent.
I asked for the pool because initially...
...Zico was going to be inside of it, having a beer.
But it ended up creating a strong chromatic element...
...the yellow and blue with São Paulo in the background.
It's a sequence that, visually, I adore.
The yellow of his T-shirt and the yellow of the canopy.
The blue of the pool, the gray São Paulo sky.
In short, it is a scene that appeals to me...
...that I consider beautiful.
We see the rivalry between the brothers.
The beginning of Deusdete's bad luck begins here...
...when he asks for a gun to defend himself.
Here's something funny that Clóvis invented.
The guns and the drugs hidden in a water tank.
From this moment on, his destiny is sealed.
This was shot at Vila Prudente...
...near Cambuçi, a huge urban slum.
We gave work to many people, many children, many adults.
We never had a single problem.
We never lacked a plug, a cable, an electrical part.
There was a whole team involved in this simple night scene.
About 100 people, including electricians...
...carpenters, technicians, extras.
It looks so solitary, as if we'd just shown up and shot the scene.
Behind the scenes, there was a roped area...
...with about 2000 people watching the shoot.
We distributed candy and chocolate to the children...
...so they kept their mouths busy chewing...
...to avoid distracting the actors.
This church is real, but the decoration with lamps...
...was prepared by the art department.
We began preparations at 3:00 p.m. And finished shooting at 1:00 a.m.
I decided to reveal the church at the end of the sequence.
I thought it was more of a surprise, and an elegant ending...
...to a bewildered Deusdete's scene...
...totally in shock at what he had just done.
We return with Chico...
...in this improvised studio inside Carandiru.
Obviously, the camera is placed where there would be a wall...
...a wall facing the door, totally covered with black cloth...
...to avoid any backlight.
We used a huge reflector outside to create...
...daylight coming from below the door...
...which is the only lighting in the scene.
Once again, Milton Gonçalves was marvelous.
A great actor, a man capable of amazing transformations.
This scene with the coins was shot in slow motion.
At 100 frames per second.
This is the penitentiary's heart, the kitchen...
...where food is prepared for the 1800 inmates in this pavilion.
And here we see, for the first time...
...Ebony as head of the kitchen...
...and the man who listens and offers advice.
It's worth remembering that the entire cast...
...with the exception of lvan de Almeida...
...who plays Ebony, Wagner Moura, who plays Zico...
...Milton Gonçalves and Caio...
...were prepared in three or four months...
...before shooting began, in groups as large as 400 people.
We tested more than 1000 actors.
Over 300 were chosen, and in the end there was...
...a final group near 80 people...
...trained by Penna, an acting instructor...
...without whom it would have been very hard...
...to endow the actors with such realism.
Here, Floriano Peixoto and Ricardo Blat...
...the two friends we saw on the first day...
...when the doctor arrived at the penitentiary.
This scene was shot at kilometer 44...
...of the lmigrantes Highway.
I wanted dense, green forest and the asphalt road...
...so that the green would break the gray's monotony.
The gray of the road reminds us of the penitentiary's gray...
...and the green, of the generosity of nature.
It was a contrast in colors that interested me...
...and works as a chromatic relief for the spectator.
We used three cars, two of which were burned.
When one was consumed, we had to ignite another.
We had difficulties with the weapons...
...since the actors had never used guns professionally.
This is a dilemma we find in Brazil.
The actors are great interpreters and very interesting men...
...but usually don't have the ability to ride horses...
...use guns, fake blows and falls during fights.
For this, we had a special tutor...
...a shooting expert and a weapons instructor.
We hired a martial arts instructor.
In short, we provided training for everybody...
...before shooting began.
This was shot at lbirapuera Park.
This child gave us quite a bit of trouble.
Shooting this short sequence took us the whole day.
The child refused to be separated from his mother.
One of the most difficult days...
...in the entire film was shooting with this child.
This group of bank robbers...
...is the only upper-middle-class group in the film.
If we can call someone who lives in Morumbi upper-middle-class.
But it demonstrates that, in their taste...
...they have a decent home.
It is the only melodramatic story in the movie...
...which I've always liked, as opposed to others.
I like this feud between the wives...
...which blends jealousy, betrayal, gossip.
It's my melodramatic Argentine side that likes this story.
Once again, it's a location where the clothes and place...
...have vivid, tacky colors, but once more...
...to create a contrast to the monochrome of the penitentiary...
...where gray and khaki are the predominant colors.
Leona Cavalli, an actress I discovered at the Teatro Oficina...
...working with José Celso Martinez Correa.
She's very sensual, intelligent.
I'm sorry I didn't have larger roles for some...
...actors and actresses in the movie.
But not everything we desire is possible.
This is a bank, kindly put at our disposal by Unibanco.
It was very hard to get a safe-deposit vault...
...since they are rare these days.
Even though this one was no longer in use...
...it worked perfectly for the movie.
It's a totally sterile place with no shelves or anything.
Just safe-deposit boxes.
This shot was done twice.
We had problems with the guns, they didn't work properly.
But I like the final result.
One believes in Ricardo, that he's frightened...
...disappointed. Nobody imagined this could happen.
She was obviously aware of what was going to happen...
...but the plan backfired and she forces a smile...
...pretending not to understand what happened.
We return to the penitentiary. I avoid showing him spit blood.
I thought it was too strong.
And this is one of my favorite moments in the movie...
...when he asks if toddlers remember what their fathers do.
And then, he dies in peace.
This closes a narrative block.
Symbolically, the stairs are washed, announcing the preparations...
...for visiting day, with water washing away the week's filth...
...something that's done on a weekly basis.
There's a show in the morning, in this case...
...with the muse of the penitentiary.
This is a number of her repertoire, which she's done for years.
Rita began with Chacrinha, in the 1960s or 1970s...
...and this is a number she performs in penitentiaries...
...where she is adored, desired, coveted...
...and respected by the entire prison population.
We had 800 extras in this scene, brought from all over São Paulo...
...in buses that left the outskirts at 3:30 a.m.
All of them controlled, numbered and registered...
...who arrived at the penitentiary at 5:00 a. M...
...were put into costume, prepared and fed.
In short, with absolute safety.
It was fascinating to work with this mass of humble people...
...who worked for a little over $ 10 a day...
...and behaved wonderfully, doing everything we asked.
It's not easy to deal with 800 people and ask for silence.
It was an interesting experience of absolute cooperation...
...which one would never manage outside the Third World.
This festive situation is a didactic scene...
...to introduce a new character, the condom...
...a warning to the community to protect itself against diseases...
...of all kinds, knowing the high incidence of promiscuity...
...that occurs in a community where 8000 men...
...live together without women for weeks, months or years.
Obviously, the Brazilian symbol of the buttocks could not be absent.
We see Rita doing one of her audacious routines...
...driving the masses insane...
...with her playful obscenity...
...and the free distribution of condoms among the inmates.
Switching from this euphoria, we have the melancholic wait...
...of the prisoners for their families...
...filmed at Carandiru itself.
One can see the pavilions in the background...
...which were populated at the time.
The prisoners called out to us, made signs...
...and gestured, saying, "We're here, and you're there...
...and you can come and go as you please."
This is the actual reception, or triage, at Carandiru.
Six or seven rooms with a large bench...
...and extremely precarious conditions...
...where people line up at dawn to be able to get in...
...and take food to their loved ones.
Parents, siblings, wives, children, in-laws, friends.
A shocking setup, really.
Obviously, my commentary does not take into consideration...
...what these people might have done to be in jail...
...but the conditions they live in are medieval.
Here we have an improvised gymnasium.
Two-liter water bottles used as weights...
...a great invention that only poverty can devise...
...or the lack of resources.
And here we are again in the courtyard of the real Carandiru...
...with approximately 600 extras...
...depicting families and groups...
...for which we devised activities.
The children chose to sing on the stage.
I took down their names and promised to invite them...
...to the film's debut, and I was shocked to learn...
...that none of them had ever gone to the movies before.
Dagger continues his pilgrimage, leading us through the different...
...situations at Carandiru. At the same time he is part of the landscape...
...that is part of the narrative told by the film.
All these stands were set up by us.
The extras, the props, the food.
It was a tough job that required the work of 160 people...
...and more than 400 extras.
This scene reveals a curious fact.
It introduces a new character called Catarina...
...a character that is already part of the folklore...
...of Brazilian penitentiaries, the girl who wants to date...
...and marry an inmate because this will give her...
...the guarantee that she will not be betrayed.
We're still at Carandiru. You can see the blocks...
...and other wings behind the walls.
Here, a heartbreaking situation, the inmates' children...
...playing soccer in the corridors while their parents...
...indulge in intimate visits, only allowed in latter years.
This scene is a blend of realism and comedy.
I chose to depict it like this.
How true this is is open to discussion...
...but I think it was worthwhile.
Ebony with his wife, whom we saw when he was arrested.
The janitors and, once again, we meet up with Dagger...
...but we don't know what he's doing or where he's going.
Here, a surprise. Dagger sees the chief janitor...
...and behaves as if he were standing before the director...
...of the penitentiary, especially since he is...
...with his wife. The moment that commands greatest respect...
...is when an inmate meets a colleague with his companion.
They dare not look at another man's woman.
This fellow won't have a happy end in Carandiru.
Now, a traveling camera shot mounted on 70 meters of track...
...which began back at the green door and halts here.
And then continues, following the characters...
...all the way till here, where it is raised by a crane...
...revealing the space where they disappear and then leading...
...to a dynamic cut showing Dalva leaving with the kids.
And here, we have a confrontation.
A confrontation where the bigamist is forced to decide...
...which of the two women he will remain with.
A great interpretation by Maria Luisa and Aida Leiner.
Ailton, as Highness, is splendid in this situation.
He is honest, sincere, trying to explain...
...the importance of each of his two women...
...but they are implacable.
In the background, we see the doctor, observing the situation...
...and Mr. Pires, getting a shave from an inmate...
...who is Bristles, using a razor...
...something unacceptable in a prison in the First World...
...but at Carandiru, everything is possible. Or almost everything.
This is a sequence that shows her tenderness...
...for the man she once knew, who is no longer the same man.
And once again, expresses a repressed attraction...
...between these two half-brothers.
He can't accept the fact that she never admitted...
...what he thinks happened, which she neither denies nor confirms.
It's basically an interpretation scene.
This is Júlia's first film, a young, 18-year-old actress.
Dagger continues his trajectory. We're back at Carandiru...
...in the late afternoon, and the light is cooler.
Here, we used a large crane.
I like this final take very much.
Here, a traveling shot from left to right...
...revealing the character.
We see Dagger paying off the guard...
...and we understand this is the yellow wing, where the film began.
This will be obvious in a couple of seconds.
Dagger moves about with great confidence...
...worthy of a man who isn't afraid of anything.
We worked with little light to create a sinister atmosphere.
This reflection of the lamp on the wall was intended...
...to create a disorganized situation.
The characters are revealed...
...all of them gripped by great sadness...
...as they are isolated from the world.
We're not quite sure what this is leading to.
This was filmed with a hand-held camera.
And here we meet Gilson, the rapist...
...who was sent to this safe haven.
There was a long sequence before this...
...a rap sung by Ebony's son...
...but it ended up being too long...
...and we cut directly to Ezequiel...
...trying to propose that his sister...
...have sex with some of the inmates...
...in exchange for money to pay his debt.
Now, we're at the Vera Cruz studio, in Antônio Carlos' cell.
An unusual situation, with a birthday cake.
We see a child, whom we believe...
...to be his dead friend's son...
...that she has decided to raise.
The camera draws closer, almost imperceptibly.
And a cut to a curious situation, a marriage proposal.
For this sequence, Rodrigo looks as masculine as possible.
We see that his father is an army officer...
...by the insignia on his lapel.
A tough man, and it's amazing how the lady that plays...
...Rodrigo's mother looks like him.
We only realized this when the shot was filmed...
...after testing almost 12 actresses for the part.
I never thought I'd chosen someone so similar to Rodrigo.
A lucky choice.
We're at Carandiru again, as Sunday comes to an end.
The courtyard is a mess...
...and we introduce a new character, Dadá.
One of the saddest scenes in the movie is the exit...
...which heightens the pain and sadness...
...that accompany the families as they say goodbye...
...to their loved ones after visiting day.
This scene worried me because Ebony's son...
...who is behind Caio, seems to look at the camera.
But then I thought, "Whoever notices this...
...is not paying attention to the movie...
...and therefore, the movie is no good."
Anyway, there was no way to fix it.
Thankfully, nobody has ever mentioned anything about this.
Here we used leather straps to suspend Enrique Díaz...
...who played the part of the rapist.
He was strung up dead to pretend he was hanged.
This is a famous sequence, the reading of the blood tests...
...to know who has the AIDS virus.
And this confusion between the result being positive or negative...
...and what negative and positive mean regarding the illness.
Rodrigo is simply phenomenal, and so is Gero in this scene...
...as we'll see in a moment.
Gero's mimicry, the transformation of his expressions, is fabulous.
He goes from joy to pain...
...to sadness...
...to amusement.
And then, a shadow comes over his face.
Judgment day.
We're back in the heart of the penitentiary, the kitchen.
The objective of this sequence is to show Zico's humiliation.
There's nothing that hurts an inmate more...
...than being made fun of by his colleagues.
An amazing interpretation by Milton Gonçalves in this scene.
Nothing is forced. He's exhausted.
We're in Chico's universe now.
We see that the balloonist's cell is decorated with balloons.
This scene contains what I consider...
...the best dialogue in the film.
In my understanding, it's symbolic dialogue that sums up...
...the story of the film and was used as the film's slogan.
Here we go back to the two brothers.
Zico is totally spaced out, having a hallucination.
There's an invisible enemy whom he thinks...
...wants to poke his eye out. A great interpretation by Wagner...
...and splendid lighting by Walter.
The sound of the television was mixed very loud...
...to emphasize the hallucinatory atmosphere.
This scene had to be shot 10 times...
...to make sure we got this right.
It was necessary to stay with Deusdete for a few moments...
...to give Zico time to light his pipe and smoke crack.
This is the first time Deusdete really confronts his brother...
...totally humiliating Zico.
Old Chico finally meets with his family.
The scene was shot from a distance...
...from the director's point of view.
Who, unlike one imagines, is not an evil man...
...but simply someone who must enforce discipline...
...so the jail doesn't become a whorehouse.
It is a delicate moment in which father and daughter take a walk.
This ceramic device is a Carandiru invention.
It has never been patented.
Both gas and alcohol to make fire are forbidden.
Every cell has its own kitchen, where they heat up...
...the food their families bring on weekends.
There's a cold neon light behind Wagner...
...meant to increase the scene's dramatic punch.
And here, a great trick. When the camera is raised...
...Deusdete jumps off the bed and avoids the water...
...which is cooled with nitrogen to give off vapor.
Here, another scene of the group debating...
...the crime that occurred among them.
It has to be tried, but the verdict is uncertain.
We cut to a comical moment, which is the wedding.
The glittering dress used by Lady Di was made...
...with cellophane and cigarette packets, as well as yogurt boxes.
Everything was made with recycled material from the jail's trash.
A touch of Fassbinder...
...and a totally theatrical wedding, a joke, a cheerful, joyous moment...
...of brotherhood. In short...
...a counterpoint used in the narrative structure of the film...
...to relieve the moments of tension.
So we move from a trial to a trivial moment...
...a joke, albeit true in the context of the characters.
They exchange rings and take all the obligatory steps...
...of a heterosexual marriage.
Rodrigo looks beautiful, and Gero looks fabulous in a smoking jacket.
It's a moment in the film I like very much.
Saying that, with all the medicine he learned there...
...when he gets out, he intends to work as a doctor...
...save up, build a house and live with Lady Di.
To me, this is very delicate and beautiful.
We continue at the studio, in the penitentiary we built.
The long corridor seen from another angle.
We get to Highness' cell.
In this cut between scenes...
...Zico put on a leather breastplate...
...to withstand the dagger thrusts. It had blood bags and everything...
...that were needed for the scene. Some knives are retractable.
Others aren't. This one isn't, for sure.
But this one is.
We took down the back wall...
...and put the camera behind Zico's neck.
Then we put the wall back.
And here we see Dagger, who is going to deliver the death stab.
But something stops him.
This is another cell we built.
Ezequiel is in dreadful condition.
Consumed by drugs.
And Highness, who had been a charming, playful...
...and daring character, transforms himself into a messenger...
...of evil.
He's going to try to convince or force Ezequiel...
...to confess to stabbing Zico, so that everything is resolved.
In exchange, he will have a bed, clean clothes and obviously...
...crack to smoke at will until he dies...
...since, after all, Ezequiel has AIDS.
These knives are all made with iron blades...
...cut and sharpened by the prisoners themselves.
This sequence of Ezequiel handing in the knife...
...had a conclusion which was deleted...
...but was worth seeing.
Zico is placed on a stretcher with his brother, Deusdete...
...and in death, they embrace.
It's a very important moment in the film.
Many of the elements used in the movie were taken from Carandiru.
Here, Chico is leaving, wearing a white jacket which is mine...
...and part of a suit I had made 10 years ago...
...and must have worn once.
It was a little tight for him, but I liked that.
Here, we're at the real Carandiru.
This is the exit door at Pavilion 2.
All of this is real.
We see the courtyard outside.
The only scene in the movie that has a realistic tone...
...contains elements that make us understand that...
...it can't be happening, since we know that Zico is dead.
And we know that Deusdete is dead.
Meanwhile, there's nothing to indicate that it isn't true.
Deusdete sobs in an insistent lament...
...and groans constantly.
And the transference of pain happens here...
...when Dagger realizes he has the stigmas...
...of Zico's death on his body.
In absolute despair, he wakes up and realizes it was a dream.
This scene has one of the most interesting...
...dialogues in the movie...
...in which a professional hit man asks the doctor...
...if he is going insane simply because he wasn't able to kill...
...which is the only thing he knows how to do.
And he even asks the doctor if there's medication for this.
This whole scene was constructed around Dagger...
...his shoulder and profile...
...and now, we cut to a close-up of him.
And now, the narrative configuration is conventional...
...panning back and forth.
Another interesting shot at the end of the scene.
We see the doctor's anguish...
...and understand that Dagger is completely confused...
...and no longer understands who he is.
This bridge sequence, without any dialogue...
...is to assist the narrative and reintroduce Ebony's son...
...who was young when his father was arrested and is now an adult.
He must have committed some crime and is imprisoned with his father.
This rain is artificial.
We used 20 pipes all along the roof...
...with water trucks pumping water for a few hours...
...to obtain this steady...
...and perfectly perpendicular rainfall without any wind.
It wasn't hard to find evangelist extras.
The piano player is really blind.
It was hard to mix this scene because the noise of the rain...
...muffled the dialogue.
This is Dagger in his finest moment.
One of those magical moments that one creates in movies.
And this closes the second act of the film...
...and the third act begins with a soccer championship final...
...which we reduced just to Carandiru...
...with 1000 to 1100 extras.
We depict the final match between two pavilions.
Here is a funny invention by the art department.
They created one of the uniforms...
...with a marijuana leaf on the chest.
And here, something that couldn't be left out...
...the presence of the Brazilian national anthem...
...a fundamental part of every sports event in Brazil.
A scene that reminds me of all the World Cup finals...
...a unique moment in which we are all equal...
...no matter our social position or the guilt we feel...
...for having done something wrong.
This moment, when the anthem is played, is totally hypnotic.
One can't take one's eyes off the screen.
A Brazilian conscience flourishes in everyone...
...in a very strong, natural and instinctive manner.
There's a feeling of brotherhood, equality.
We live in the same country, have the same culture...
...the same needs. Something very beautiful happens...
...whenever the anthem is played, and we managed to convey this...
...very naturally. The extras are not prisoners.
We used about 1000 men, and they responded very naturally.
And it could not have been any different.
The doctor is summoned for the kickoff...
...something that really happened with Drauzio in the final...
...on October 2, 1992, and right after the end of the game...
...began the events that the film will soon narrate.
We never intended to narrate...
...the soccer game, as it wasn't important.
What mattered was creating a time passage for the doctor's exit...
...after the kickoff.
This scene shows how friendly some of the inmates are with the doctor.
And here, we have another narration.
But this time, it is not a reflection in the present...
...but him talking in the past.
An inmate wants to hang his underpants to dry...
...but Bristles doesn't let him.
And a fight ensues.
This sparks a confrontation between different factions...
...which is immediately controlled.
And now, a new narrative element, which are the depositions...
...in the future, referring to the past...
...in the voices of a few characters we know.
The game continues. There's a foul, a penalty.
And the penalty leads to an argument.
Red card, as is the norm.
It's not hard to thrill Brazilian extras with a goal.
The action returns to the studio.
The confrontation gains momentum.
It's very hard to shoot fights in cinema.
Americans, with their action movies, have imposed a model...
...for fights, car accidents and spectacular jumps.
I wasn't interested in shooting a fight that wasn't Brazilian...
...but I could not hurt the extras, who were not specialized...
...in fights and falls. So we created a pandemonium.
And this pandemonium leads to another very significant moment.
We had 600 people, who were told to make...
...the greatest possible ruckus without hurting anybody.
Which is what happened.
And this is the beginning of a violent manifestation of anger.
Apparently, without any real reason...
...but motivated by a deep discontent which the inmates...
...have harbored for months and years.
The elevator shaft was ideal...
...to film 360-degree panoramic shots.
The special effects worked wonderfully. Nobody got hurt...
...even though the scenes were immensely dangerous...
...with dozens of people running down a burning staircase.
We did not obtain permission from the military police.
We had to make the uniforms...
...collect archival material from Globo TV...
...dress all the soldiers, find helmets, shields...
...machine guns, horses, dogs.
Everything had to be re-created...
...which was unique in a Brazilian production.
We used 400 policemen, prepared by our cast-training team.
A team of over 30 special effects people in each window...
...making fire, blowing smoke, directing extras...
...yelling directions. The fire department was called in.
In short, an operation that took a week to shoot...
...and produced the next three or four minutes of film.
Six hundred prisoners divided in several windows.
The script had to be shot window by window for each line.
It was very hard because we had to maintain the continuity...
...of the fire, the smoke.
All the material seen here was taken from research...
...conducted in newspapers and TV newscasts.
There's nothing in the next 10 minutes of film...
...that wasn't studied in depth...
...or based on facts that really took place.
The knives were handed in when the director requested them...
...to avoid the entrance of the military police.
I like this knife rain sequence very much.
It's totally unique.
I've never seen anything like it in cinema.
The white sheets asking for peace...
...as seen during the rebellion.
The director's complete lack of good judgment...
...trying to demonstrate that he has control of the prison...
...and asking everybody to return to their cells.
Until someone more rebellious decides to say what he thinks.
The reconstruction of the invasion was obviously invented by us...
...but this was the geographical space where everything happened.
I tried to reproduce what I thought a troop...
...with 12 horsemen, 12 dogs and 350 soldiers armed to the teeth...
...could have done upon entering the penitentiary...
...containing 1000 unarmed men, in the dark...
...with water leaks all over the place.
A churchgoer was ordered to guide the police...
...into the penitentiary...
...because they didn't know how to get in.
This is a true fact.
The invasion was conducted in the dark.
None of the soldiers had training for this kind of operation.
The prisoners threatened them, saying they all had AIDS.
And obviously, the first casualties occurred.
The weapons used were prepared especially for the movie.
They only shoot blanks.
The bullets tearing into the inmates were all prepared...
...by professionals we brought from Argentina and Mexico...
...to help us with the firefight.
We worked with hundreds of people running all over the place.
Thankfully, we had no accidents.
The military police were entirely made up of our actors.
We had no assistance from the military police.
They told us that the incident at Carandiru...
...had blemished their organization...
...and that they were sorry...
...but could not offer protection nor assistance.
We tried to reinvent the attack following depositions...
...of inmates who survived the massacre.
And what one sees from here on is fictional...
...but based on true facts.
It was all filmed with two or three cameras...
...one of them in slow motion...
...and we took about 10 days to shoot the massacre...
...working 14-hour shifts...
...and everything that is shown in this movie...
...follows what Dr. Drauzio Varella was told...
...by inmates who survived the massacre.
The sparse dialogue in this scene was taken from the records.
The criminal responsibility suit...
...for what happened that day remains untried.
One hundred and eleven inmates were killed...
...and not a single soldier was even wounded.
This structure of depositions is very interesting.
It helped me tell the story and give an afterlife...
...to the characters, which is a way to say they weren't killed.
They didn't die that day.
I looked for a way to close the massacre...
...without having to invent more executions...
...which could end up being excessive.
From this moment on, I invented a ballet...
...performed by a ballet group from São Paulo...
...that is a danced poem inside the movie...
...that works as a short allegory to the madness of that moment.
The music here is fundamentally important.
We were very pleased with the work done by André Abujamra.
This lonely guitar that sounds so dramatic.
So out of tune, so synchronized with the brutality of the scene.
I feel deeply moved whenever I see this.
The idea of the dog searching for something.
And he finds the celebrated penitentiary cat...
...who came from Carandiru to the studio...
...and was with us throughout the whole shoot.
Here is a sort of epilogue, with different lighting.
More macabre, more somber.
And the most dreadful moment, when the inmates who survived...
...are taken to the courtyard.
We have 1200 prisoners lined up.
They spent two days with us...
...reproducing, perfectly, photographs published...
...in the most important Brazilian newspapers.
Nothing was manipulated.
This is how the inmates spent the night...
...as documented.
This powerful, biblical image of submission, guilt...
...and humiliation ended up being the movie's poster.
I always thought it was the image that best represents...
...the barbarism depicted in this film.
The story continues with the cleaning of the bodies...
...as narrated in Drauzio's book...
...according to witnesses that were there.
Those who helped carry the bodies were executed...
...to avoid witnesses.
Here we have a traveling shot that begins with Dadá...
...and moves back slowly...
...passing through the door.
We see bodies strewn all over the floor...
...while Dadá reads a psalm his mother wrote to him.
Here, we understand that perhaps he was chosen to survive...
...and become one of the narrators of the story.
We return to a narrative element we've already seen in the film...
...which is the staircase.
But this time, there's no dirt, but blood.
And gradually, the blood is washed away...
...and the empire of white is reborn...
...forming an abstract stain...
...that leads us to the end of one of the most difficult...
...and ugly moments in Brazil's history.
The doctor tells us now, at the end of the film...
...what would be the opening of the film.
Who he is, what he has come to do...
...what he thinks and what he achieved...
...in all his years of practice at Carandiru.
The train stops at Carandiru station...
...in front of the penitentiary, and the doctor...
...on a new working day, returns, as he has done for 14 years...
...for another day of weekly volunteer medicine.
This text is from the prologue of Drauzio's book.
And our story ends here.
With the film almost ready, we were rewarded...
...with the surprise of the implosion of Carandiru...
...by the authorities of the state of São Paulo...
...a spectacle we registered with nine cameras...
...on a gray morning in December, 2002.
This is a film that consumed three and a half years of my life.
I began preparations at the beginning of 1999.
The script was completed at the end of 2001...
...the movie was shot in 2002 and made its debut in 2003.
It would have been impossible to make this film...
...without the persistence and writings of Dr. Drauzio Varella...
...in his book Estação Carandiru.
All the names seen in the credits have a special meaning...
...to the existence of this film. Thank you very much.