Bope Movie Backfires

Hello Americans and Brazilians in the US: has anyone heard anything about Tropa de Elite coming out in the States? The representative for the American distributor won't respond to my emails and they're already 3 months late in releasing the movie.

Anyway, Globo had this little story recently about how in 2008, the number of applicants to BOPE tripled. After the movie was released there were 1,000 applicants, coming from all over Brazil. One applicant noted he was applying because he thought he'd get more women and make more money.

But like in the movie, very few applicants actually make it through the final rounds of training to become actual BOPE officers: during a recent course, 567 people signed up to go through the intense boot camp training, and only 18 were left at the end.

The movie in question, "Tropa de Elite," was trying to show the abuses of the BOPE and how much of what they're doing is in vain, in an endless, bloody urban war, and that although at first glance it may be "glamorous" to be a part of the elite force, it is actually destructive and horrible and turns you into a ruthless, heartless killer. People apparently didn't really get that.

Oh and by the way: you have to be a military police officer in Rio or a similar Brazilian institution linked to the police in order to apply.

Comments

[Adam]

I read that Brazilian newspaper delivery boys in Boston were selling a $10 copy of Tropa de Elite with the morning paper.

[Joe Smith]

I have friends that have an apartment in Vidigal and they claim to have seen the supposedly untouchable members of BOPE selling weapons to the traficantes there...So much for the police that cannot be bought.

[Alejandro Garcia]

Dear Gringa.

Though you are certainly more well informed about Brazil then most people, I have to disagree with your interpretation of the movie Tropa de Elite. I saw the movie as well, and found it very informative. It doesn't glorify the violence that police commit in the favelas, but it also goes along way toward exposing the hypocrisy displayed by their critics, a hypocrisy that adversely helps perpetuate the violence.It's true that the police in Brazil (and throughout the rest of Latin America) are often corrupt or ruthless in their tactics, but that is only because they are faced with a ruthless enemy, an enemy for which they are given very few legal tools to effectively combat. Surely you've lived long enough in the country to know that the penal code is both outdated and largely inneffective. There is no death penalty, or even a provision allowing life sentences. The maximum penalty allowed under the law is 30 years(of which only one person has ever actually served full term). All criminals (without exception) are entitled to parole within ten years. That's for serious crimes like murder. Drug violations get far less. Imagine if the US penal system worked the same way. These drug dealers are hardened, cold-blooded types. They recruit children into their organizations, often forcing them to give up school or work so they can become full time dealers, look-outs, or street soldiers. I'm dead certain most of you have seen the movie City of God, which in my opinion goes great back to back with Tropa de Elite, because it tells both sides of the story and shows you the atrocities that these gangs commit in favelas. It should come as no suprise that the police perform so many extrajudicial killings; for them its a choice between allowing hardened criminals back on the street with a slap on the wrist or "doing a service to the community" by taking another thug off the street permanently. Don't get me wrong; I'm not trying to defend their actions. I strongly condemn them, only because such killings are counter-productive to mission itself. These killings vastly undermine the communities faith and trust in the police that is already heavily damaged by corruption; as a result many favela dwellers refuse to give information on the drug dealers who, paradoxically, are systemically destroying their community (though I most point out that fear of retaliation from the gangs, as well as distrust if the police, is a very important factor as well.) The sad fact is that so long as the penal system in Brazil remains weak, these killings will continue. It's a tragic irony that (and the movie portrays this very well) the biggest opposition to these long overdue reforms comes from well-heeled university students and philantropists, who, oddly enough, are the drug dealers largest source of income and patronage.

So whether it's in Petare, Tijuana, or the south of Colombia; wherever you have a poorly paid, poorly supported force, its a sure bet that such incidents will continue, until real changes are made.