Review of República dos Assassinos

During military dictatorship, a death squad composed by policemen is legally appointed by state government and is celebrated as heroes, the "men of steal"(!), in newspapers. Together with other important support characters, the film follows mainly the life of one of those elite-backed death squad murderers, a vain womaniser and ambitious man played by Tarcísio Meira, and a poor transgender who makes a living however is possible, brilliantly played by Anselmo Vasconcelos. There are many violent scenes of summary executions and mysoginy, but the one that is rightfully the most mentioned is not about violence, but about love: Anselmo Vasconcelos and Tonico Pereira kissed each other. It was the very first homosexual kiss in the history of Brazilian cinema. Off course this would be enough for making the film to be taken as important and brave. However, I shall also mention that it is very well done, and it is no less remarkable that they portrayed criminal activities backed by official state institutions during military dictatorship, that was still active (it was released in the very year of Amnesty, when military authoritarian rule began to be softened). A good movie with a quite good casting.