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Brazilian police brutality drama wins at Berlin fest
2008-02-16
A blood-soaked Brazilian drama about police brutality, "The Elite Squad", beat out favourites from Hollywood and Britain to win the Golden Bear for best picture Saturday at the 58th Berlin Film Festival. Director Jose Padilha based his first feature film on actual accounts of violence and corruption among the security forces in Rio de Janeiro. "The Elite Squad", which sharply divided critics and whose win came as a surprise to many festival-goers, was a major box office hit in Brazil. But some critics accused Padilha of glorifying the brutality he aimed to condemn. Padilha, 40, accepted the statuette from this year's jury president, Greek-French filmmaker Costa-Gavras ("Missing"). "Costa-Gavras is a hero for all Latin American filmmakers so it's extra special that we're here," he said. The jury's runner-up prize went to "Standard Operating Procedure," a probing look at the systematic abuse of Iraqi prisoners at Abu Ghraib prison. The film, by Oscar-winning director Errol Morris, was the first documentary ever to enter the competition in Berlin, which ranks among Europe's top three film festivals. The best director prize went to US filmmaker Paul Thomas Anderson for the heavily favoured "There Will Be Blood" in which British-born Daniel Day-Lewis gives a towering performance as a tyrannical oil prospector. An early critics' pick at the 11-day festival, the film has already been nominated for eight Academy Awards. It also picked up a Berlinale gong for its haunting score, composed by Radiohead guitarist Jonny Greenwood. The best actor Silver Bear went to Iran's Reza Najie who starred in "The Song of Sparrows" as Karim, a father working as an ostrich farmer on the outskirts of Tehran who moves to the city when he loses his job. "I would like to express my thanks to the Berliners, who are lovers of art," Najie, 65, said as he accepted the statuette. And luminous British actress Sally Hawkins picked up the prize for her turn as an infectiously optimistic school teacher in Mike Leigh's "Happy-Go-Lucky." The film was also a Berlinale favourite as an upbeat respite from Leigh's usually dark fare and the other 20, overwhelmingly grim competition pictures. The 31-year-old Hawkins, who also appeared in Leigh's abortion drama "Vera Drake", thanked the director. "He is so supportive to an actor -- it doesn't get much better than Mike," she said. Best screenplay went to Chinese filmmaker Wang Xiaoshuai for "In Love We Trust", his melodramatic tale of a middle-aged divorced couple trying to save the life of their young daughter, who suffers from a rare blood disease. The Golden Bear winner, a Brazilian-Argentinian production, had drawn favourable comparisons with the 2002 international arthouse hit "City of God", which also turned the spotlight on Rio's mean streets. But cinema industry bible Variety said it played "like a recruitment film for fascist thugs." It was the first Brazilian picture to win the Golden Bear since 1998, when "Central Station" by Walter Salles took home the top prize. The film depicts a police clean-up campaign in Rio's crime-infested favelas, with scenes of teenage dealers being tortured with plastic bags over their heads and druglords shot at point-blank range. It is set in 1997, ahead of a visit to Brazil by Pope John Paul II. Members of Rio's Police Special Operations Battalion (BOPE) are given orders to clean up the slums "so that the pope can sleep". Padilha, a documentary-maker who admires Martin Scorsese, told reporters after the film screened that "every scene in the film is based on truth." "We have a very corrupt police force, a very violent police force. In Rio de Janeiro, 1,200 people a year are killed by the police. The population hates the police and with very good reason," he said. The script was co-written with a member of BOPE and the actors spent months with other members of the squad. The 11-day Berlinale screened nearly 400 pictures and attracted 20,000 accredited visitors from 125 countries. It wraps up Sunday. This year's event had a distinctly musical tone, opening with the world premiere of "Shine A Light," Scorsese's concert film of the Rolling Stones, whose presence boosted the celebrity quotient. Singer-poet Patti Smith and rock legend Neil Young also promoted films focused on their lives and music. The biggest splash by a first-time filmmaker was made, inevitably, by Madonna, who whipped up a paparazzi frenzy as she unveiled her directorial debut "Filth and Wisdom". Most reviews acknowledged that the film had a certain charm although several echoed the advice of Britain's Daily Telegraph that Madonna "would do well to hang on to her day job."
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