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'City of Men'

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BY GENE SEYMOUR | gene.seymour@newsday.com

February 29, 2008

Fernando Meirelles' "City of God" (2002) set out to not merely absorb, but engulf its audiences in a sweeping multi-decade account of drug dealing and gang violence in the meaner favelas of Rio de Janeiro. Its impact was relentlessly explosive - and frequently bombastic.

"City of Men," produced by Meirelles, but directed by Paulo Morelli, takes a somewhat calmer (but no less flashy view) of the same terrain by focusing on two childhood buddies, Ace (Douglas Silva) and Wallace (Darlan Cunha) who struggle to stick close, maintain their sense of humor and survive in a mostly squalid hillside neighborhood that has become a site for violent gang warfare. Both reached 18 without a father in their lives and the loss affects them in different ways, with Ace ill-equipped to care for his own baby boy and Wallace convinced that finding his own ex-con father after all these years will bring coherence and purpose to his life.

That "City of Men" is assembled from a Brazilian television series reminds you that HBO's "The Wire" has brought to similar material the kind of broadly informed detail and narrative strength that this movie sorely needs. Yet despite its contrivances and flashiness, "City of Men" somehow wins you over with its steady, underlying flow of intimacy and compassion.

CITY OF MEN (R). 1:51 (violence, sexual material). In Portuguese with English subtitles. At Angelika Film Center and Lincoln Plaza Cinemas, Manhattan.