Trash
Director: Stephen Daldry
Starring: Rooney Mara, Martin Sheen, Wagner Moura
111 mins; Class TBA;
KRS Releasing Ltd
A man clearly in distress. The police are at his door. He manages to evade them for a while in a desperate escape and chucks his wallet onto a garbage truck before he is set upon and arrested.
The wallet carries on its journey to the dump in the centre of Rio de Janeiro’s favelas. Dumped onto large mound of tonnes of waste, the wallet is found by two boys Rafael (Rickson Tevez) and Gardo (Eduardo Luis).
They are thrilled with the cash they find inside… but when the police show up, led by the shadowy Frederico (Selton Mello), the boys realise the wallet must contain something of vital importance.
Based on a successful young adult novel by Andy Mulligan, Trash is adapted by one of Britain’s greatest screenwriters, Richard Curtis. Better known for his comic output (including the timeless Four Weddings and a Funeral.)
Curtis shows an equally dab hand at drama and, while telling an extraordinary story, his script for Trash effortlessly captures the different characters.
Director Stephen Daldry smoothly takes that script and presents an absorbing visual and emotional experience.
A solid drama with its fair share of light moments
With its high production values, sceptics may dismiss this as a Hollywood exercise in do-gooding. Yet, Daldry and his team have created a solid drama with its fair share of light moments and a clear social message that lingers soon after the credits roll.
The film opens with a scene of hundreds of kids sifting through massive mounds of trash to eke out a living – so vividly depicted you can almost smell it – while your heart goes out to them.
We are immediately introduced to two of the film’s three young protagonists and Daldry draws out natural, unvarnished and ultimately winning performances from Tevez, Luis and Weinstein, three non-professional new-comers and in them lies the heart of the story.
They are an infectiously optimistic trio, with a common bravery and sense of justice they boast because of and not despite the deprived conditions they live in; and the film celebrates their resilience in the age-old battle of good vs evil.
Popular Brazilian actors Selton Mello and Wagner Moura are on fine form as the corrupt police officer and an investigative journalist respectively, while flying the American flag are the ever-reliable Martin Sheen, whose Fr Juillard sums up the seeming hopelessness of the battle against corruption.
The book faced some controversy on publication, its subject matter and various instances of violence and bad language deemed unsuitable for its target audience.
Yet, Mulligan is unapologetic, saying children should not be blinded to the truths of the world we live in. And Daldry takes this to heart, in his no-holds-barred depiction of these kids’ difficult poverty-stricken lives, and the rampant police corruption.