In "De Passagem" ("Passing By"), Jéferson (Silvio Guindane) is a military school student who takes a leave as he's informed of the mysterious sudden death of his street-wise younger brother. As Jéferson and former childhood friend Kennedy (newcomer Fabio Nepo) leave their slum in the outskirts of São Paulo and cross the big city in buses and trains to identify the dead brother's body in a morgue, flashback scenes of the three kids reveal the happenings of an eventful day years before when they were forced by a trafficker to make a drug delivery that turned out tragically wrong.
The film has professional qualities, considering it's young filmmaker Ricardo Elias's debut feature. The two-buck budget isn't really a problem here, and the cinematography is efficient (though unimaginative), but the pace is so annoyingly slow it feels like a short film over-extended (by the way, I don't have a problem with slow-paced movies per se). Though with plenty of time at its disposal, "De Passagem" barely scratches the surface of the painful themes it's supposed to deal with, such as violence, drug dealing, corruption and absence of public assistance in Brazilian favelas, wasting instead precious time in no-action no-dialog dreary shots of train stations, railways, buses, etc.
The characters are two-dimensional and underdeveloped, lacking depth and life, with contrived, stereotyped behavior and motives -- the "good" suffering mother, the strict religious military father, the sleazy sadistic clerk at the morgue, the nice teacher, the corrupt policeman etc. The little experienced actors do what they can with the material but are far from exciting (although Fabio Nepo has a great face). Some scenes are terribly phony, like the policeman's accidental death (what about that ludicrous fake-looking wound!). At the end, one can't help feeling there are too many misses in the situations and dialog, which are mostly blah and often don't ring true.
"De Passagem" is an honest film, but lacks insight, boldness and emotional power. It pales in comparison with similar subject films like recent dazzlers "City of God" (Fernando Meirelles, Brazil, 2002) or "Ratas Rateros y Ratones" (Sebastián Cordero, Ecuador, 1999), among others. But it must be said this film won many awards in one of Brazil's most traditional film festivals (Gramado), including Best Film, Director, Screenplay and Supporting Actor (Nepo), so you be the judge. Just don't see it if you're feeling sleepy, impatient or demanding.
