City of God

The main message of City of God is that violence only breeds violence. The society is shown as relatively peaceful at the beginning of the film, with only a few "innocent" hold ups in a relatively nice area. "The hoods" share their profits with the locals and are generally decent people. However, this low-scale violence ramps up in the second portion of the film, as one gangster takes over the entire city. Each act of violence merely causes a larger retaliation, ad infinitum.

The film uses several scenes with quick cutting, giving the film an almost non-stop feel. Even during scenes that are relatively slow, the use of bleeding the sound from the following scene into the end of the current scene keeps the pace moving. The use of split-screen in some scenes allows some action to happen in one scene whilst a more conversation-based scene takes place on the other side. At all times the story seems to be moving forward, helped by the regular narration that allows the story to jump characters, locations and time periods without any confusion. Mostly it is shot in a documentary style, using handheld cameras and colour desaturation to create a feeling of realism. Sometimes, however (specifically the shot of Rocket standing between the two gangs, taken from the matrix) it uses more advanced cinematic techniques.

The film was set in the nearby favelas - filming was not possible in the actual Cidade de Deus as it was still too dangerous. The film was almost all cast from actual favelas - only one established actor was in the film, in the role of Carrot.