Kattiera Nana I think this is a new genre that they're all sort of working their way through it and haven't got all the kinks worked out yet but it's a genre that works for me.

Vashirdfel Simply A Masterpiece

Ariella Broughton It is neither dumb nor smart enough to be fun, and spends way too much time with its boring human characters.

Kirandeep Yoder The joyful confection is coated in a sparkly gloss, bright enough to gleam from the darkest, most cynical corners.

Rachel Henderson Salles never disappoints, and his film "Linha de passe" is no exception. The movie tells the story of a middle class mother raising four boys in a large and unforgiving neighborhood in São Paulo, Brasil. Unlike Salles' most famous movies, "Linha de passe" does not tell a story of a hero or of a dramatic and impressive story of people overcoming extreme circumstances. It is a pure and undramatized story of a single-parent family just "getting by." The acting is believable to the point it is difficult to imagine the actors as anyone else but their characters. The writing is impressive, with five stories depicted and developed yet there is an amount of inconclusiveness left up to the imagination of the audience. It seems as though this story was received by Brazilians as being true and honest to what a picture of the typical life of a family in Brazil. As an American, I appreciated the apparent authenticity of the movie as shown through the excellent cinematography and writing. I would definitely recommend this movie.

Chris Knipp This collaboration between Walter Salles (Central Station, The Motorcycle Diaries) and previous co-director Daniela Thomas provides a look at the struggles of urban Brazilian youth without melodrama or ultra-violence. (Salles saw Fernando Meirelles and Kátia Lund's City of God as an impressive film but one that misled the public into thinking every Brazilian kid packs an AK-47.) The texture of the film is gritty, but attractive. Like the boys in Visconti's Rocco and His Brothers, the focus is on the sons in a family who have a natural glamor, but are presented in a neorealist style. Linha de passe is a term for passing a soccer ball from one player to another without its touching the ground. An English language title hasn't been found yet; the French used simply Une famille brésilienne/A Brazilian Family. The film is engaging, if a bit chaotic. The May-through-September time-lined structure helps add organization, but the effort to move constantly back and forth among five different characters and scenes becomes wearying toward the end, though the lack of any resolution certainly is an honest reflection of the protagonists' near-hopeless lives.Living in the slums of São Paulo, the country's most populous city, Cleuza (Sandra Corveloni, who won the Cannes Best Actress award in 2008 for this performance) is a hard, spirited woman who smokes, works as a housekeeper, and keeps having sons by different men. Cleuza is an obsessive soccer supporter with four boys, none of whom knows who his father is. She's pregnant again, and when her mistress notices, she edges her out by hiring another woman to replace her. Cleuza's youngest, Reginaldo (Kaique de Jesus Santos), who is black, is intent on resolving the mystery in his own case. He believes his dad is a bus driver and so spends all his spare time riding buses, befriending drivers, and learning how to drive a bus. His final exploit of stealing a bus and driving it off on his own, designed to draw attention to himself and thus lead him to his father, is based on a true story.Reginaldo is feisty, handsome, and precocious and his exploit is amazing, but the film balances its attention among each of the sons. Dario (Vinicius de Oliveira, who when very young starred in Salles' Central Station) is a talented soccer player who wants to make it on a commercial team. But having just reached 18 he is at the limit for hiring of newbies; when he finally finds a coach still interested in his impressive ball handling, shooting and (with prodding) teamwork, he finds out he has to come up with a big "tip" to get the team official to ease him in. Dinho (José Geraldo Rodrigues) works at a gas station, but his life revolves around evangelical Christianity. He's had some badness in his past, but is determinedly righteous now. Dênis (João Baldasserini), the oldest, has a small boy he very seldom sees and cannot provide support for as a motorcycle messenger. He is still paying for the bike. This need for money leads him to crime.The settings are real and gritty and the main actors, save Vincius, had no previous experience. All this contributes to the vigor, spirit, and naturalism of a narrative that grounds its drama in sociology. It begins with the statistical fact that a large percentage of São Pauolo's children are fatherless. There is little sense of social organization or services here.Dênis' momentary turn to theft and carjacking leads the film as far as it ever goes into Hollywood actioner territory. Meanwhile Dinho is having his faith tested and seriously losing his cool, little Reginaldo is moving up to joy-riding a giant bus, and Dario, who earlier went on a dangerous drug and alcohol spree in frustration, is seemingly getting that big break on the soccer field, but his lack of money to bribe the manager may doom his chances. Everyone is moving boldly forward, hopeful in the face of despair. One ends the film feeling wrung out and uncertain. Salles has become seemingly more realistic but also more pessimistic by now than he was when he made the emotionally moving but somewhat saccharine 'Central Station,' and he does not wreathe his ghetto youths in mist as he does the Che Guevara of 'The Motorcycle Diaries.' This is a valiant effort, with many engaging elements, but the final effect is somewhat lukewarm.The editing by Gustavo Giani and Lívia Serpa is unfailingly clear; it is not their fault if the focus on five plot lines at the end of the film becomes a little overwhelming, and ultimately numbing. If this is the influence of Iñáritu, that is always a dangerous one.Premiered in May 2008 at Cannes, 'Linha de Passe' is still unreeling in various countries. Seen at the San Francisco International Film Festival May 29, 2010. In the dual-theater projection, an unfortunate staple at the SFIFF, the print did not look very good; presumably a fault of the projection and not of highly experienced d.p. Mauro Pinheiro Jr.

Welington Santos More than a movie, Linha de Passe is a study about the moral and ethical dilemmas that young people from Brazilian suburbs of big cities face on a daily life. It is a film much more rich and complex than it seems. By the apparent simplicity and fragmented structure, should not have the same impact of the Brazilian Central and the Motorcycle Diaries, Walter Salles recent productions.The Cannes Film Festival confirmed the film to grant him the Golden Palm for best actress to Sandra Corvelloni, single mother of four children, maid and resident of Sao Paulo suburbs. The family, by leaps and bounds, struggling to survive in the metropolis. The oldest is Motorcycle courier, Dinho works in a gas station, Dario wants to be a soccer player and youngest Reginaldo, in brilliant interpretation, is obsessed by her father unknown.The script, written by Daniela Thomas, Bráulio Mantovani and George Moura, gives an account of five characters who have to kill a lion a day and are faced with ethical dilemmas at every turn, choosing between them to deliver anything goes or to remain in line.

Bruno Cassiano Walter Salles and his longtime partner Daniela Thomas come at their best with 'Linha de Passe'. After shooting Dark Water (which I haven't seen but only heard bad things about it) and the predictable Motorcycle Diaries, Salles focused on his best ability: showing the real Brazil to the world and - even more important - to Brazilians themselves. The acting is so accurate that sometimes the movie looks like a documentary about people who strive to have a decent life despite living in a poor suburb in São Paulo. Not only Sandra Corleoni - who won the Palme d'Or - is brilliant, but nearly everyone, even the characters who are not so much in evidence. I would say that this the movie captures the contradictions of the urban Brazil in such a profound way that it leaves you with little else to talk about the subject. Although each character kind of represents a particular stereotype of Brazilian people, there's so much subtlety in each of them (because of the screenplay and the acting) that the plot sounds completely natural, which doesn't happen with 'Crash', the awarded American movie that 'Linha de Passe' reminds me of. In my opinion, Salles' masterpiece is still 'Behind the Sun' (Abril Despedaçado), but if a foreigner asked me to explain what's to be Brazilian, i would suggest him to watch this movie.