<br /><div class="MsoNoteLevel1CxSpFirst" style="margin-left: 0in; text-indent: 0.5in;"><i><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman";">Bus 174</span></i><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman";"> is a 2002 Brazilian documentary film, directed by Jose Padilha, that tells of the life of Sandro do Nascimento, and his robbery turned bus hijacking in Rio de Janeiro.<span> </span>The documentary tries to discover what brought Sandro to commit the crime, and why events played out the way they did.<span> </span>The film presents an interesting dynamic that exists in Rio de Janeiro, and (according to the readings by Mark D. Szuchman and Alberto Ramos) other major cities across Latin America.<span> </span>The dynamic being the apathy that the authorities have toward the poor of the cities, and the fact that crime, in some cases, is treated as a matter of fact in the cities.</span></div><div class="MsoNoteLevel1CxSpMiddle" style="margin-left: 0in; text-indent: 0.5in;"><br /></div><div class="MsoNoteLevel1CxSpMiddle" style="margin-left: 0in; text-indent: 0.5in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman";">Crime stems from extreme poverty and the apathy of those in power.<span> </span>Both of these factors have been present in Brazil since it began to urbanize in the eighteenth century, and according to Szuchman:</span></div><div class="MsoNoteLevel1CxSpMiddle"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman";">The growth of the population meant an increasingly complicated set of decisions for municipal authorities.<span> </span>Economic growth failed to eradicate poverty, and this was illustrated by the opulence that marked homes and public buildings while a floating population of indigents languished in public areas.<span> </span>(12)</span></div><div class="MsoNoteLevel1CxSpMiddle" style="margin-left: 0in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman";">Little has changed since then.<span> </span>Sandro was a part of Brazil’s current floating population of street children.<span> </span>Even though at the beginning of Brazil’s urbanization the government tried to end poverty with some projects, they eventually gave up because they believed that “the poor were victims of their own moral shortcomings.” (18)<span> </span>Szuchman also mentions the diary of a poor Brazilian woman that chronicled “instances of violence, alcoholism, disease, and hunger that characterized the lives of thousands of people.” (23)<span> </span>Sandro, as seen in the documentary, witnessed all of these things, including the death of some of his friends.<span> </span>They died at the hands of police during the Candelaria Church Massacre.<span> </span>Szuchman concludes that: “Police have given up on many barrios in … Rio de Janeiro, and elsewhere, where their own safety is not guarunteed.” (25)<span> </span>That sad reality is seen clearly in the documentary, especially in the conditions of the prisons.</span></div><div class="MsoNoteLevel1CxSpMiddle" style="margin-left: 0in;"><br /></div><div class="MsoNoteLevel1CxSpMiddle" style="margin-left: 0in; text-indent: 0.5in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman";">The seemingly true story by Alberto Ramos depicts a robbery similar to the one that Sandro committed, except it involved a taxi instead of a bus.<span> </span>It illustrates the matter-of-factness of crime in Latin America.<span> </span>The situation is so similar to Sandro’s that the person being robbed formed a kind of camaraderie with his robbers. (137)<span> </span>The thieves even have a similar motive to Sandro, in that they mention a friend that was hurt before. (137)<span> </span>The author of the story, like some of the hostages on the bus, comes to feel like they could trust their aggressors more than the authorities: “And I thought that we are so screwed in this country that the only option left to us in the end is thanking the thieves.” (137)</span></div><div class="MsoNoteLevel1CxSpMiddle" style="margin-left: 0in; text-indent: 0.5in;"><br /></div><div class="MsoNoteLevel1CxSpMiddle" style="margin-left: 0in; text-indent: 0.5in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman";">On a side note there was something else of interest, something Sandro’s adopted mother said.<span> </span>She said at one point that he said he wanted to be an artist.<span> </span>After she said that it was hard to view the footage as anything but a performance art piece.<span> </span>A terrifying and deadly one to be sure, but one none the less. Just a thought. <span> </span></span></div><div class="MsoNoteLevel1CxSpMiddle" style="margin-left: 0in; text-indent: 0.5in;"><br /></div><table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-sK7ccmNAj1M/TZkQlYBrsMI/AAAAAAAAABU/LgsJG0sPLEc/s1600/comradejd.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="271" src="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-sK7ccmNAj1M/TZkQlYBrsMI/AAAAAAAAABU/LgsJG0sPLEc/s400/comradejd.jpg" width="400" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Comrade Judging Dog Finds You Guilty. And Ambiguous. </td></tr></tbody></table><div class="MsoNoteLevel1CxSpMiddle" style="margin-left: 0in; text-indent: 0.5in;"><br /></div><div class="MsoNoteLevel1CxSpLast" style="margin-left: 0in; text-indent: 0.5in;"><br /></div><div class="blogger-post-footer"><img width='1' height='1' src='https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/tracker/1378570525637450649-2910744682586295402?l=dcaldwellhistory475.blogspot.com' alt='' /></div>
