Redundant and unnecessary.

Let's be realistic.

what a terribly boring film. I'm sorry but this is absolutely not deserving of best picture and will be forgotten quickly. Entertaining and engaging cinema? No. Nothing performances with flat faces and mistaking silence for subtlety.

The movie's not perfect, but it sticks the landing of its message. It was engaging - thrilling at times - and I personally thought it was a great time.

I was recommended this movie on several occasions by some of my Brazilian friends, and was never able to find the time to watch it. I always prioritized other movies. Still, in the back of my mind, I really wanted to watch it. I finally did, and man I was disappointed. I was expecting something as gripping as City of God, as entertaining as Tropa de Elite, but no. Trash was definitely a lot worse than these two movies. I don't think there ever was enough tension in the movie and the characters felt a little amusing sometimes. At least that's my opinion. Not every movie can be a masterpiece, so I guess I'll judge this one as just another decent movie coming from Brazil, with the typical Favela kids vs Underworld Bosses + corrupt police. Decent. That's it.

The common images of Brazil are soccer/football, Carnaval, the Amazon rainforest, the beaches, and Christ the Redeemer. A less flattering image of Latin America's largest country is the favelas, tightly packed ghettos full of people ignored by society. Stephen Daldry's "Trash" looks at some teenage inhabitants of the favelas who are digging through garbage one day when they find a wallet that could upset local politics. Not surprisingly, they become targets of a merciless police force.This is what one might call the real Brazil. Much like Fernando Meirelles's "City of God", "Trash" shows what life is like for a large portion of Brazil's population. When the boys cross into the downtown, one can see a sharp contrast between this part of town and the slums where the boys live. One of Lula's goals was eliminating hunger, but he and Rousseff weakened their legacies by demolishing favelas to make room for sports stadiums (and it's all but certain that the Olympic stadium will never get used after the games next year).This is a different turn for Daldry after his past few movies. Although "Billy Elliott" also dealt with class issues, "The Hours" focused more on gender issues (I haven't seen "The Reader" or "Extremely Loud and Incredibly Close"). I'd say that Martin Sheen's long-time political activism makes him the right person for the role of the priest servicing the favela. All in all, it's a really good movie. I recommend it.

When I saw that Stephen Daldry directed this it was enough to put me off watching it. However...it's well put together, well shot, edited, scripted and the young leads are superb. The poverty porn is problematic, the shots of the waste dump are aesthtically pleasing, the shots of the favela likewise. Films and other texts like this one can serve to assuage those of us living in relatively privileged conditions that actually for people living in abject poverty, well, you know, life isn't so bad at all. There's a stronger sense of community and people get on and look after one another. If you want a proper, serious, grown up film with a Latin American spin about poverty and what it does to people then look elsewhere to Pixote from 1981 or Luis Bunuels's Los Olvidados from 1946. If there's a better film than Los Olvidados on the subject out there I'd like to know what it is. All that said, I was entertained by this, I liked the points the film made about corruption on the part of the police and politicians, I liked the way it foregrounded street children as characters. Another more serious film about street children is Ali Zouaua made about 2002 in Morocco featuring a cast of Casablancan street urchins. Trash is a great movie to show young teens to get them thinking about global issues or as an introduction to world cinema but for serious social commentary one needs to look elsewhere.

A brilliantly exciting film from start to finish. The three boys are a triumph, and the way the film handles them, and uses their emotional closeness, their friendship, is a credit to Director Stephen Daldry and his crew, as well as to the three boys themselves, recruited from the streets of Brazil. The story jumps from one level of excitement to the next in a series of clever set pieces that, at the same time as they increase the tension to almost unbearable levels, answer the questions raised by the mystery; what exactly is the significance of what the boys find, as they comb through the giant mountains of trash, trying to earn enough to eat from recycling plastic and tin? The chase scenes through the favelas are exhilarating. Literally, you find yourself talking out loud. The film is a celebration of Andy Mulligan's stunning novel of the same name.