Cidade Baixa 2005

Critics score:
60 / 100

Reviews provided by RottenTomatoes

Rene Rodriguez, Miami Herald: Strong performances by the three leads ... help to make up for the story's sliver of a plot. Read more

Tom Keogh, Seattle Times: Everything feels obvious and by-the-numbers, as if director and co-writer Sergio Machado was constrained by archetypes and narrative tradition. Read more

Ruthe Stein, San Francisco Chronicle: With a distinct lack of action, Machado resorts to far too many close-ups of his stars until, as good-looking as they are, you tire of looking at them. Read more

Noel Murray, AV Club: Machado ... saturates his directorial debut with rich, golden color, defining it with close, handheld shots that accentuate the feeling of skin on skin. Read more

Michael Hardy, Boston Globe: Everyone involved in the film seems better than the material. Read more

Kevin Crust, Los Angeles Times: The themes are all familiar and the plot unfolds slowly and in predictable ways, but there's plenty of heat generated by the three leads. Read more

Michael Wilmington, Chicago Tribune: Tells a familiar story with an emotional intensity and a high eroticism that makes a lacerating impact. Read more

Lisa Schwarzbaum, Entertainment Weekly: A pleasurably swollen Brazilian soap opera. Read more

Terry Lawson, Detroit Free Press: A steamy love triangle that may earn our attention primarily on prurient interest, but ends up being honestly involving. Read more

Ella Taylor, L.A. Weekly: This frenetic potboiler about a love triangle on the Salvador waterfront smacks of liberal slumming and bristles with faux authenticity. Read more

Stephen Williams, Newsday: The film is gritty and graphic, with 'artsy' takes where the camera holds on a motionless actor. But art it isn't. Read more

Elizabeth Weitzman, New York Daily News: There's also something patronizing about the zeal with which Machado wallows in the muck, especially since his characters' lives revolve entirely around sex. Read more

St. Louis Post-Dispatch: Read more

Bill Stamets, Chicago Sun-Times: Brazilian filmmaker Sergio Machado scores a strong debut with this look at young hustlers in a lovers' triangle. Read more

Dave Calhoun, Time Out: Lower City is essentially an intimate, well-observed, compassionate film about what happens when lust gets in the way of friendship. Read more

Deborah Young, Variety: Though the storyline is dirt simple (can friendship outlive jealousy?) and not particularly meaningful or involving, the action in this character-driven film is scintillatingly sexy. Read more

Michael Atkinson, Village Voice: It's slick homogeneity, co-produced by Salles and co-funded by the Brazilian petroleum giant Petrobras, of a kind that commonly finds U.S. distribution while far better, riskier, more memorable films on the international table are ignored. Read more

Stephen Hunter, Washington Post: The result is something you've seen many times but never quite like this. Read more