Carandiru Critic Reviews

Carandiru is Babenco's fourth film set inside some type of incarceration facility and meshes his documentary style and fondness for realism with the escapism of storytelling found in "Kiss of the Spider Woman." It plunges us deep inside a corrupt system and its sincere empathy creates a stirring mix of emotions. Read the full review

Exudes a throbbing flesh-and-blood intensity so compelling that it's impossible to avert your eyes. Read the full review

The movie is powerful, if numbing. What movie about a massacre isn't? Read the full review

It is Carandiru's ability to humanize its central characters ... that gives the movie its wrenching, tragic powerRead the full review

The warden implores the prisoners to relinquish their weapons, and out of the cells come flying a zillion blades of all sizes. In a Mel Brooks movie, this bit would be funny. Here, it sums up the chilling situation in five seconds. Read the full review

In a prison filled with vivid, Dickensian characters, several stand out. There is, for example, the unlikely couple of Lady Di (Rodrigo Santoro), tall and muscular, and No Way (Gero Camilo), a stunted little man. They are the great loves of each other's lives. Read the full review

Harrowing but compassionate. Read the full review

Angry and tragic, Carandiru is finally, in its own way, uplifting.Read the full review

Lays on the compassion a little thick, yet its heartfelt squalor stays with you.Read the full review