Composition of Anita Németh, high school student, about Favela Rising (dir: Jeff Zimbalist and Matt Mochary, USA- Brazil, 2005) screened for students of 'Zrínyi Miklós Gimnázium, Budapest' participating in 'Student Verzio' at Toldi cinema, 9 November 2005.
Teacher: Judit Szántó

Házi dolgozat Miután láttam a filmet nagyon sok kérdés fogalmazódott meg bennem. Elég megrázó, hogy vannak a világon olyan emberek, akik ilyen körülmények között nőnek fel vagy éppen meg sem élik a felnőttkort. Anderson -akiről a film szól- elég rossz irányban indult el fiatal korában, ami érthető,mert a fiatalokat könnyebb befolyásolni,és ugyebár nincs sok lehetősgéük a "normális" élthez. Anderson is a könnyebb utat választotta,és beállt drogkatonának. Hasonló "foglalkozásokról" hallottam már itt Magyarországon is,de itt még nem fajultak el annyira a dolgok. Nem tudom elképzelni,hogy én hogyan tudtam volna felnőni egy favellában. Valószínüleg ugyanazt az utat választottam volna,mint Anderson eleinte. Mégha úgy is gondolom,hogy undorító a drogok miatt embereket mészárolni,ilyen helyzetben én is azon emberek közé tartoztam volna,akik a könnyebb megélhetés érdekében lealacsonyodnak a vadállatok szintjére. Ami a legjobban megrázott,hogy Anderson és sok ember szenvedett olyan dolgokért amihez semmi közük nem volt. Mikor megöltek a favellában egy rendőrt,azonnal kitört a káosz. Attól fogva nagyon sok rendőr mészárolt le ártatlanokat,akiknek semmi közük nem volt a gyilkossághoz. Ezért mészárolták le Anderson családját is. Akkor lett elege és akkor kezdett rájönni a helyzet súlyosságára. Ahogy látta az utcákon kiterített 21 áldozatott elkezdett gondolkodni a helyzet megoldásán. Végül így született meg az Afro Regee. Onnantól kezdett el nagyon megtetszeni a film. Mert pontosan tudom,hogy milyen mikor az emberek zenében fejezik ki a bánatukat, vígságukat, szerelmüket, haragjukat vagy bármilyen érzelmüket... Egyszerűen elmondhatatlan. És nem csoda, hogy szó esett a filmben Shiváról is mivel minden innen indul ki! Aki már hallgatott igazi indiai zenét az tudhatja, hogy mért adott erőt Andersonnak Shivában való hite. Shiva képes rombolni de ugyanakkor csodálatos dolgokat tud teremteni,s az emberek nagyrészt ezeket a csodálatos dolgokat a zenében hallják, látják meg. Mert a zene nem tartozik semelyik droghadsereghez sem rendőrséghez sem semmihez. A zene az mindenkié! Ezért tudta Anderson ráébreszteni az embereket arra, hogy van még miért küzdeni, amit a magukénak tudhatnak.Elkezdtek zenélni és rendeztek partykat is, sokáig csak a favella egy része vett részt benne de később már kiterjedt az összes favellára is. Sikerült a gyerekeket is rávenni arra, hogy ne drogkatonának menjenek hanem tanuljanak, hogy élhessenek akár 70 évig is és legyen biztos megélhetésük is. Ezért 2002-ben már csak 25 drogkatona volt az összes favellában. Véget vetettek a mészárlásoknak,a drogkereskedlemnek és minden törvényellenes dologknak.

Mindeddig fogalmam sem volt arról,hogy milyen jó helyzetben vagyok/vagyunk ,akik Magyarországon élünk.(Azért nem a legjobb-ban).De a film láttán és mivel sokat tanulok Shiváról rájöttem,hogy vannak fontosabb dolgok annál,hogy holnap milyen nadrágot veszek ,vagy hétvégén hova megyek partyzni. Egy ideje jobban megbecsülöm az apró dolgokat,mert nem mindenkinek lehetnek saját cuccai vagy bármilyen "luxus" dolgai. De ami mindenkinek van az a zene. Az mindenhez erőt ad.

 

Compositions of high school students, about Favela Rising (dir: Jeff Zimbalist and Matt Mochary, USA- Brazil, 2005) screened for students of 'II. Rákóczi Ferenc Gimnázium' participating in 'Student Verzio' at Open Society Archives, 8 November 2005.
Teacher: Katalin Gádoros

It was very interesting to see how different the population in Rio de Janeiro is. To be a drug dealer is a more common job than for example to work in an office. Not only for adults but for minors as well is drug trafficking an ordinary work. Moreover, children's dream job is to be a drug soldier. They don't want to study or to work like other people in other countries, they want to belong to the drug army mostly because when you are not a member of a group you will be despised by the others. Unlike in European countries, in Rio you are cool when you have a motorbike and a machine gun. And even if you are not trafficking you are not safe in the streets. Dealing in the streets there is like asking someone to lend you a tissue. Massacres are also ordinary. And many innocent people are killed in these. The situation is very bad, but since Afro-Reggea started to play and teach with their songs, the number of drug dealers was reduced.
Leonetta TARCSA

This film is about the person who wants to change children's and people's life, because the place where he lives, Rio de Janeiro's slums is full of drug and violence. The man, whose name is Anderson realized, after he had lost his brother in a massacre that life has more choices than to be a drug dealer or a drug lord. So he and a few friends started a newspaper but they could not get money for it. After that they founded a band, the Afro-Reggea. It was a new thing there,because everybody had guns and motors, violence ruled the place and police aggression. This band sang about the life in the slums and about what people do there. The band started with a few people, they walked the streets and played their music. Anderson says music is the thing which can change life. They went to schools and asked the children to be in the band. Anderson is a man who never gives up. And no wonder he is the voice of the community.
Tamas VALLUS

Anderson gave hope to the favela, and that was what helped them to smile in the biggest poverty and to make the choice between two paths of life.
Eszter TIMÁR

The film is about Brazilian people in the slums of Rio the Janeiro. The film is full of blood and violence. The main character is Anderson, who wants to change his lifestyle. He lives in a favela. In a favela even the minors carry machine guns and pistols and they sell and buy drugs. There are drug lords and drug armies with drug soldiers. They fight each other. If a teenage boy has a motorbike and a big gun, the girls love him. Anderson decides to edit a newspaper. He wants to change the life of the young ones. Then he starts a music group together with Junior. The film tells they story. I liked the film because it is true. It tells a story of people I did not know anything about them. I thought they were just poor, but not. They cannot find a job, so they sell drugs. If you see this film you can say you have learned something important.
Márton FÖLDI

I think this film was very good. It is about a complicated problem, the violence in the slums. I don t think these people in the slums are evil, most of them are just doing what they can and have to do. A drug lord cannot just quit, and an ordinary person cannot do anything against living under violence. The police also have to be violent or nobody cares about them. This situation is scary. And I think it is more scary that a handful of people have enough courage to try to change it. These people tried to change this situation by bringing culture to the poor people in the slums. The music and the dance they brought there were typically Brazilian stuff, only the people in the slums had forgotten about these. It was the Afro-reggea band that that brought these back to them. And it worked. The people started to believe in something. They could find their strength in this culture. It was strange but nice that this culture united with the starring (or almost worshiping) of Anderson SA. That person was magnificent. He has a strong will, he could even regenerate from a serious injury and help his people further. I think this is good that there are persons like Anderson SA, but I do not think that with culture one can always bring peace. In other countries in the Middle and South Americas the governments should try and bring strong culture to the people so that they can unite against violence, just like here. But this can never work if there is only one culture against an other one.
Tamás LOVÁSZ

I have already heard about the poor people of Rio de Janeiro. I also saw photos about the favelas but I did not know anything about the life of the people there. This film showed me all. I was astonished to see their life. Before I saw this film I thought they had a terrible, poor but peaceful life. I then realized it was not true. In my opinion the most terrible thing was the violence. The good thing was the communities, where they tried to change their life and learnt to dance and play reggae and learnt also to listen to each other.
Attila HERCZEG

I think the film was not so special but it was not bad, either. The film presented another opportunity to that how people can live. The favelas and the life in them were very scary. But it was interesting that some people realized that it can be made better. And Afro-Reggae was the most interesting for me. It is a good thing that people try to stop violence with music and with a community team. The size of the population was scary for me, too. I think violence will never end and I do not say it is good but this is why I do not like the same films. I think everybody has problems, not only them, we have problems, too. I know ours are not that big but these are also problems. I would not like to watch more films about catastrophes.
Zsuzsanna HERCZEG

I really liked the film. It was a very beautiful and strange turn in that guy's life (I forgot his name) that he chose to play music and live in peace after all his friends had been murdered. The strangeness about it was that I think the police should have made him angrier and he should have wanted to be a drug lord, but he realized it was not the good thing to do and he changed himself.
András DOROZSMAI

This film is about a rapper's life. He had a dangerous lifestyle. In the beginning he was working for the drug maffia. He was a dealer. One day the cops killed his brother. The rapper did not want more violence so he and his friends started a band, the Afro Reggae and they sang about drugs and the life in the favelas. When they became popular the rich invited them to give concerts, where they again spoke about violence and about how people can stop it in the favelas. In the end he had a neck injury and was paralyzed, but then he became healthy and so that he had many friends who agreed with his views so he continued his concerts.
Csaba VIZOVICZKY

This film for me was a little bit shocking, but it was also very interesting. I knew that in Brazil, in Rio de Janeiro people were drug trafficking and everybody was living in danger. But it was only when I saw this film that I realized what a terrible life they have. In Hungary we cannot see drug dealers running along with machine guns in hand but in the favelas it is a common sight any day. It was also terrible to see when the police raided the city and killed a lot of people and then, as if they had done a good job, left the city. Minors, at a very young age get involved in drug trafficking but there came this music, the Afro-Reggae which radically changed the life in the nine favelas where it was invited. No more drugs for those there. It was very good to see what music can do in I don't know how many years exactly, but the number of drug dealers dropped to less than the half.
Gergely MIKLÓSY

I think it was a good film. It was very exciting, but too much violence in the film, and it's real life. I didn't like the police because they hit civil people and I don't know why. The police get angry and they kill people because they despise poor people. The Afro Reggae group wants to stop drug trafficking because the young are suffering. I think it's a good idea but it's difficult and dangerous. The poor in the favelas followed Anderson and him group. They believe the world will change. They want to change the life of the young. The favelas are very dirty and very poor and people there accept life as it is. I think it's not good. Many favelas follow Afro Reggae. In the end Anderson cracked his skull but he stood up and continued his mission.
Bora BODANITZ

I think the film shows how people live in the favelas and what choices young people have for their future. Strangely they only have two choices: to be a drug soldier or to be a worker. The interesting, or rather terrifying thing is that a worker gets $13 a week, and in the drug army one gets $600 a week, so you can buy more things and be a girl magnet if you join the drug army. Also, it's better for you to be part of a group. But this drug army life has a bad side, too: you have to be very careful because the policemen can get you and many young men never reach 20. I think Afro Reggae offers a third chance where you won't be chased by the police or the drug groups won't pick on you. Afro Reggae wants to stop violence in the streets, the war between the drug army and the police and that not with weapons but with the power of music. Strangely a few drug lords understand this, because they also realize that there is no way out of the drug life once started.
János KASNYIK

It was very interesting to watch how Anderson and the other young ones live in the favelas. The world of the Brazilian drug trafficking is small but scary, however, this is a common thing in the Third World. Afro Reggae is the beginning of a beautiful thing, which gives an other opportunity to the children of the favela. Anderson is a good leader. He wants to help his people and the young ones, because he knows the dangers, the ways of the drug lords and their army and knows how corrupt the cops and how violent the elite units are. Anderson achieved enough respect to stop violence when the Lucas drug command were trying to kill him.
Dániel MESTER

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VERZIO3 invites You and Your students to morning screenings
November 8-9-10, 2006

Toldi Cinema

Budapest V., Bajcsy- Zsilinszky str. 36-38.

Favela Rising
(directors Jeff Zimbalist and Matt Mochary, USA- Brasil, 2005, 80 min)
Rio de Janeiro, a destination for tourists and the stage of Carnival, conceals enormous injustices, violence and danger in the shadowy parts of the city. The urban ghetto is the seat of the poor and a place where numerous drug gangs operate. It is a place periodically purged by a corrupt police force. As a location plagued by violence, it is tough place to grow up for children, who on any given day can expect that someone close to them will die. However, it was in the heart of this misery and desperation that a man named Anderson Sa appeared with his dream of destroying the old society and building a better one. This messiah assembled a group of people around himself and they resolved to use music to struggle against the cruel living conditions in the area. Sa founded the musical group Afro-reggae, which not only became a resistance group against the mafia and the police but also gave rise to the establishment of a children's arts academy, where children can learn to play musical instruments, sing, and dance, which successfully fills in for an anti-drug, prevention program. Anderson's belief has spread infectiously through the surrounding areas, and the crime rates in the slums have been falling. With a doubt it can be said that this is a riveting, intellectually powerful and impressive documentary. Every minute of the film brings a new and unexpected look at a tough world and creates a portrait of an exceptionally strong and charismatic man. The visually striking film is interspersed with unexpected turns, and it shocks in its openness and intimateness. The entire length of the documentary is moreover dynamically paced with drumbeats and rapping that is well performed. The message does not ring hollow. It is not an empty utopia from another world; on the contrary, it's a live wire. The pulse that ineffaceably settles inside us begins to correspond to the beats of our own hearts. It strengthens and brings courage, and, coming across as an almost revitalizing force, it points to hope for a better future.
Wednesday, 8 November, 10 a.m. and 1 p.m., Small Hall
Thursday, 9 November, 10 a.m. and 1 p.m., Big Hall

Frontlines-Laos
(director Ruhi Hamid, UK, 2005, 30 min)
Ruhi Hamid chose Chong-Cha Lee to be her guide on a journey to the jungle and to be the intermediary during a meeting with the Hmong people, a community that has been hiding away from its persecutors, as well as the eyes of the entire world, for twenty years. It is also a community that needs to be discovered, so that it can be saved from famine and the consequences of untreated diseases. The secret village has been around since the end of the Vietnam War. At the end of the sixties, some of the inhabitants of Laos helped a secret American unit during the conflict. After the Pathet Lao's victory, the US army left and its helpers became enemies of the state. For them, the war has not yet ended even after all this time, and continues every day. The filmmaker goes on a twenty-four hour journey to show how the activities of a democratic regime espousing a policy of helping others can have paradoxical consequences. She reveals that humanistic systems advocating freedom for all can, if they only consider their own freedom, become deceptive, as well as pointing out how world powers have opted to ignore the negative impacts of their own actions, in this case hidden in the impenetrable jungle. Throughout its length, her report is accompanied by a voice-over that patiently informs the audience about the issues at stake. The film culminates in a powerful scene when the crew meet the villagers, who have not seen anyone from the outside world for more than twenty years, capturing the astonished faces of members of the second and third generation who were born in this prison. The only sounds are those of weeping, tears flowing and the rustle of the jungle.
Thursday, 9 November, 10.30 a.m. and 12 p.m., Small Hall
Friday, 10 November, 10 a.m. and 11.30 a.m. Big Hall

A secret genocide
(director Alexandre Dereims, 2006, France, 52 min)
Documentary on the genocide perpetrated by the military Burmese junta on the Karen ethnic group. Foreigners are not allowed in South Burma. This is Karen territory, an ethnic minority brutalized by the Burmese authorities. For sixty years, in the midst of this hostile jungle, the KNLA, the Karen National Liberation Army, had fought a desperate war against the military junta in power. The Burmese generals have decided to cleanse the Karen country. The Burmese army (SPCD) focuses its attacks on civilians. Whole battalions raid villages. Soldiers burn, loot, rape, execute and torture the inhabitants. There are now 300,000 Karen refugees attempting to survive in the mountains on the Thai border. Refugees suffer from malnutrition, malaria and are killed or maimed by mines. No humanitarian organization is allowed in this part of Burma, no food or medical aid has been planned for them and the Thai border police try their best to stop anyone from crossing the border. This movie was made clandestinely in the middle of the Burmese jungle with the Karen fighters of the KNLA.
Friday, 10 November 2006, 10 a.m. and 12 p.m., Small Hall

OSA Archivum / Goldberger-house

Budapest V, Arany J. u. 32.

1956 through the eyes of witnesses, from the Kádár-era and the time of the transitions Short documentary films, archive footage by amateur filmmakers, film news, video Samizdat

Pictures of the revolution (6 min)
Footage discovered in 2005, shot on October and November 1956, not yet screened in public.

1956 on BBC (14 min)
The BBC crew shot in Sopron, Győr, Magyaróvár and at the Austrian border on the last days of the revolution. Demonstrators and survivors of the fusillade in Óvár spoke to George Mikes. One of the most shocking documents of 1956. (In English with Hungarian subtitles.)

1956 through the eyes of amateur cameramen (cc. 10 min)
Footage of destroyed Pest and Buda. Ruins, funerals, hospitals, unburied bodies and tombs on the streets. The main sites of the fights. No dialogue

The image of the Revolution in 1957- 58 (10 min)
Kádár János speaks to the masses on May 1st and April 4th.

1956- before the political transitions in 1988 and in 1989 (cc. 20 min)
Opposition demonstrations on June 16th, 1988 (the day of Nagy Imre's execution) and on October 23rd (the breakout of the Revolution). The re-burial of Nagy Imre and his fellows on the Heroes' square (Hősők tere) and at Kerepesi cemetery in Budapest, on June 16th, 1989 (fragments)

8-10 November 2006, 10 a.m. and 12 p.m.

Pre-registration is required.
The films are screened with Hungarian synchron translation.
The follow-up discussions are in Hungarian.
For further information contact Nagy Ilona
Tel.: (1) 327 3250 / Fax.: (1) 327 3260 / E-mail: verzio@ceu.hu