The Urban Brazilian Child; Representation vs. Symbolism in Rio, 100 Degrees F. and Central Station

Essay by Silas Reyes '27 for Brazilian Society in Film Course in Fall 2025

How is childhood shown to be affected by socioeconomic conditions of exploitation in Brazil? How does this representation, or lack of representation, change over time as Brazil’s socioeconomic and political reality changes? In addition, how is the portrayal of the urban Brazilian child affected by the genre in which it resides? These are prominent questions which are answered by an analysis of two extremely different films: Rio, 40 Graus (Rio, 100 Degrees F.,1955) and Central do Brasil (Central Station, 1998). Both films include children as main characters, five afro-Brazilian children; Zeca, Sujinho, Jorge, Paulinho and Xerife for Rio, 100 Degrees F. and Josué for Central Station. Where they differ is their focus on representing the urban Brazilian child’s poverty versus using the urban Brazilian child as a symbolic stand-in for the nation in Rio, 100 Degrees F. and Central Station respectively. The genre conventions of Neorealism and melodramatic modes shape how the urban Brazilian child interacts, is interacted with, and moves within and between different socioeconomic spaces, and it is through the inclusion or exclusion of class and race commentary that we can map the difference between the representation and symbolism. Central Station’s melodrama doesn’t reveal anything useful about the reality of Brazil’s urban crisis, but instead uses the Brazilian child, in this case Josué, to strategically manipulate the audience’s emotions with sentimentality and push for a return to a sense of tradition which is built on the fantasy of the Sertão and is thus empty. In contrast, Rio, 100 Degrees F. uses Italian Neorealism and documentary methods to portray the urban Brazilian child as realistic, grounded, and in need of structural change. 

Both films were made in distinct historical moments of Brazil which greatly shaped the genres directors Nelson Pereira dos Santos and Walter Salles utilized and how the urban Brazilian child is employed as a filmic device. Where Rio, 100 Degrees F. attempts to call attention to the struggles the Brazilian urban street child faces by using Italian Neorealism and documentary style filmmaking, Central Station instead uses the Brazilian urban street child more symbolically through the melodrama genre in order to evoke an emotional response and provide a metaphor for Brazil’s preferred future, of returning to tradition. Director Nelson Pereira dos Santos released Rio, 100 Degrees F. in 1955, and he was inspired by Italian Neorealism and the documentary style of John Grierson and Joris Ivens which focuses on leftist humanism (San Miguel, 71). Brazilian cinema in the 1950s was dominated by the Chanchada genre, which is inspired by the large scale, technically impressive, and commercially successful Hollywood films of the same time. Brazilian studios such as Cinedia and Atlantida located in Rio de Janeiro along with Vera Cruz located in São Paulo mass produced Chanchadas as they were cheap to produce and had a proven commercially successful formula (San Miguel, 72). Pereira dos Santos, along with other Brazilian filmmakers that would eventually usher in Cinema Novo, found that Chanchadas lack Brazilian roots, and “[ignore] the country’s national, historical, and social themes” along with the reality of present conditions (San Miguel, 72). Under Getúlio Vargas’ second presidency (1951-1954) conditions in the Sertão (Northeastern Brazil) worsened as his agrarian reform laws weren’t established, causing mass migration to urban cities such as Rio in order to escape starvation and drought which resulted in the fast expansion of favelas and the emergence of the urban Brazilian street child as a fast expanding socioeconomic status. Nelson Pereira dos Santos drew on Italian Neorealism to provide an alternative model of filmmaking “devoid of the ties of an industrially-crafted cinema in favour of an aesthetics of urgency and poverty in which technique was secondary to content… [in order to] depict and denounce the different social conditions of the country”, in this case, the awful socioeconomic conditions of the five afro-Brazilian children in Rio, 100 Degrees F. as the film covers their day selling peanuts in five tourist locations: Copacabana, Sugar Loaf Mountain, Corcovado, Quinta da Boa Vista and Maracanã Stadium (San Miguel, 72). Italian Neorealism was born under a fascist Italian state and extreme poverty during WWII out of a need to portray life as it was; in crisis. The mid 20th century was a time of intense industrialization and urbanization for Brazil which resulted in the mass migration of workers from the Sertão and worsening favela conditions through overcrowding and lack of access to education, electricity, sanitation, plumbing, and clean water. Neorealism was chosen by Director Nelson Pereira dos Santos as the model for Rio, 100 Degrees F. in order to face urban poverty because that is the reality for the urban Brazilian child. 

In contrast Central Station was released in 1998, and its director Walter Salles uses the melodrama genre in order to evoke an emotional response from the audience, and suggest that the desired future of Brazil lies in tradition (as represented by the Sertão). The film follows Josué’s journey from urban Rio de Janeiro to the rural Sertão in search of his father, Jesus, after his mother’s untimely death. He is accompanied by an older woman, Isadora, who is initially very isolated from the people around her and is unsatisfied with her life. The film is situated in the 1990s revival of Brazilian cinema and disillusionment by the failures of neoliberalism which prioritized economic consumerism and integration into the global market. Salles depicts this failure through the overcrowded, impoverished, and impersonal bustle of Rio de Janeiro's titular Central Station, where a plethora of illiterate migrants from the Sertão attempt to send letters to their loved ones left behind by paying writers, i.e. Isadora, to transcribe and send them. Salles identifies the distance from ‘tradition’, both physical and historical, as the problem with current Brazilian society by portraying the modern city of Rio as isolating, dreary, and full of morally dubious people in a type of “aestheticized ugliness” (Bayman, 259). This ugliness is contrasted by the Sertanejos who migrate to the city and carry with them remnants of tradition from the old space of the Sertão (i.e. community through religion). The melodrama genre always has a need “to end in a 'space of innocence' and nostalgia” which unfortunately equates innocence to an old space (the Sertão) and as such melodrama is “quintessentially conservative” (Gutiérrez-Albilla, 147-148). The urban Brazilian child, Josué, is thus used as a metaphor for Brazil’s link to “cultural authenticity, tradition and the rural, all of which are contrasted with corrupt or otherwise problematic adult-aligned urban settings which in various ways are shown to be detrimental to the nation/the child” (Martin, 71). Salles emphasizes the sentimentality of the Brazilian orphan, its helplessness in defending itself, as seen when Josué is left with no choice but to sleep in Central Station, as well as the negative effects of neoliberal consumerism such as when Isadora initially tries to traffick him for $1000 to buy a better television. The solution presented for Josué, and thus for Brazil, is a return to tradition represented by the Sertão in a kind of reverse-migration narrative. Central Station romanticizes the relationship between childhood and tradition, of raising both into a specific maturity, but by using Josué as an innocent sentimental symbol, Salles forgoes any commentary on class and racial differences.  

Genre conventions of Neorealism and melodrama also impact the way the urban Brazilian child moves in both films; the children’s ability or inability to move within a space reveals the inclusion and exclusion of structural realities (mainly class and race inequalities within the film). In Rio, 100 Degrees F., the five children set off to tourist locations to sell peanuts and make a living; immediately director Nelson Pereira dos Santos makes clear that the children are not allowed to move freely in white, middle and upper class spaces which is based in the reality of limited social mobility for afro-Brazilians. Paulinho, the smallest child, goes to Quinta da Boa Vista and wanders into a zoo to chase his pet lizard, Catarina, where he observes exotic animals in awe (Rio, 100 Degrees F. 13:00). However, he is promptly kicked out by a guard who throws Caterina into a snake pit. The dichotomies between Paulinho’s awe, the image of a towering guard dragging an afro-Brazilian child (quite literally kicking him on the way out), and the group of white children who stroll in right after forces the audience to recognize the inequality of treatment which urban afro-Brazilian children face. In contrast Josué is able to move between urban spaces and even farther to rural spaces in Central Station without issue. He and Isadora travel by bus, train, and taxi on their quest into the Sertão, and even when they run out of money they depend on the generosity of strangers who welcome them at every turn. One of the first people to do so is César, a truck driver who gives them a lift. They stop to unload at a shop and while César converses with the shopowner, Mr. Bené, Josué shoplifts some candy (Central Station 49:20). Isadora berates him for this but instead of returning the stolen goods she shoplifts sausage and crackers, and when Mr. Bené grows suspicious of her and tries to look into her bag César defends her even though he doesn’t know her name. A moment later as they get ready to depart, César finds Josué and Isadora eating the stolen goods but doesn’t connect the dots or consciously chooses not to question it and instead also partakes in eating. As a melodrama, Central Station paints the Sertão and its people as extremely kind or borderline oblivious, pacified by their bond to tradition, in order to establish it as a space of innocence. It is after César brings up the fact that he and Mr. Bené are “brothers in faith” that Mr. Bené drops his interrogation (Central Station 51:20). Mr. Bené knows César is a good person because he shares the same values, and so he trusts his judgement of Isadora; “folk traditions and religious belief… remain, while the uprightness of a person’s character can be taken on trust” (Bayman, 260). There is no conflict in the rural, between Josué and Isadora and the people of the Sertão, and the only conflict shown in the urban spaces is the indifference of passersby, the consumerism of Isadora, and the brief glimpse into child trafficking which Josué is quickly saved from. 

The children in Rio, 100 Degrees F. experience the opposite, they are turned away at every point, thrown out of spaces not meant for them, either because they’re not paying customers, or not clean customers. They’re seen as bothersome and pushed aside except for when they can offer their labor or money. For example, Zeca latches onto a tourist family after being chased by the man who runs Corcovado and demands half his earnings. Zeca is allowed onto the aerial tramway because he accompanies the family, and afterwards he is ushered even closer to the family to take their picture (labor that he isn’t paid for) however the reality of restricted movement still emerges once he’s thrown out of the restaurant the family goes into (Rio, 100 Degrees F. 42:00). Zeca can only follow them so far and his hunger, both literal and metaphorical which stems from an absence of resources, is deemed detrimental to the restaurant’s business. Transportation isn’t kindly offered but is taken in secret, such as when Xerife sneaks into Maracanã stadium on the back of a car, or is briefly offered reluctantly in crisis, such as Zeca running away from a clear threat. The restricted movement, and how the children maneuver these spaces, reveals the spatial segregation the urban street child faces. In contrast, Central Station allows Josué an all-access-pass in every situation to make the Sertão and tradition look good.  

Rio, 100 Degrees F. pre-empts aesthetics of hunger to show the everyday threats of violence that are physical, mental, and carceral, to the urban Brazilian child while Central Station is concerned with cosmetics of hunger and uses the backdrop of the Sertão to create a narrative of tradition and generosity which renders any hunger empty. Since the Sertanejos are shown to be spiritually and physically sated, and take care of Josué’s hunger and need for transportation, the main conflict in Central Station is how Josué deals with the abstract threat of abandonment from his father (a classic melodramatic tale of domestic unrest). The difference between real, acted and implied violence compared to the abstraction of abandonment further propels my argument that Rio, 100 Degrees F. uses realist representations to call attention to the socioeconomic inequalities the Brazilian child faces while Central Station uses the Brazilian child symbolically for metaphorical gain which ignores structural inequality. In Rio, 100 Degrees F. the children’s hunger is violence enacted on them by the state through the systemic lack of resources. For example, Jorge’s mother is sick and needs him to make enough money to buy medicine. They also have to share the meat they were given by their neighbor, Mrs. Lourdes. In their favela, Morro do Cabuçu, they have to depend on themselves and each other to survive. The children’s bodies are constantly under threat outside the favela as well, they are susceptible not just to starvation and sickness, but also to violence and imprisonment. When Jorge goes to Copacabana to sell peanuts and his supply is dumped in the ocean, Bebeto (the man who caused this) refuses to pay for them, calls Jorge a criminal, and threatens to have him arrested, at which point a man passing by takes his side (Rio, 100 Degrees F. 23:30). The threat is given weight from previous scenes where security guards and police officers treat the other children poorly to varying degrees, at the same time it’s grounded in reality through the stark contrast of Jorge’s physical characteristics to the tourists on the beach. The audience is acutely aware of all five children being afro-Brazilian, and their customers being distinctly white-r and not from the favelas.  

This added layer of race and class is what Central Station lacks. Rio, 100 Degrees F. still plays on the audience's sympathy for the children, but does so not as a stand-in metaphor for Brazil’s future, but as a representation of present life for children from the favela. Josué is not an accurate representation of the urban Brazilian child, in that he was never meant to be a representation in the first place. As a symbolic stand-in for Brazil itself, he is free from the socioeconomic issues which would otherwise consume him, “[Josué] ‘replaces’ politics, functioning as a kind of universal: universally appealing, and an object of ‘universal’ identification.” (Martin, 85). He is neither white nor black, he’s a blank slate that guides Isadora, and the audience, to a fictional Sertão that represents all the good of tradition. The conflict between rich and poor or white and black, the structural realities, are not identified since the ruling class is absent. What little acknowledgement of inequality there is, is quickly swept away by the relationship between him and Isadora. The fact that his mother is illiterate, and Isadora profits from the illiteracy of many other northern migrants, is just the way the world is in Central Station. There is no turnaround, no effort to provide resources, and no change. The only threat Josué comes under is the threat of abandonment, of not finding his father, which would point to the state's failure to provide for him, if not for Isadora and later his older brothers Moises and Isaias stepping in to take care of him. 

The lack of adult care and supervision in Rio, 100 Degrees F. emphasizes the need for structural changes in order to care for the urban Brazilian child, whereas the role reversal of Josué guiding and transforming Isadora in Central Station pays no attention to any structural issues in favor of melodramatic emotion and the metaphor of returning to tradition. In all their interactions with adults, specifically tourists, the five children of Rio, 100 Degrees F. have no choice but to be independent; begging, bargaining, and bolting to escape violence and make money to survive and support their families, which are very real struggles. Josué on the other hand, is able to escape this fate by travelling away from Rio, and its corruption, and closer to his father and tradition. Therefore, he is in a position to instead guide Isadora and the audience along with him back to the light of tradition, “[he is] symbolic of innocence and virtue, [and] comes to stand for the antidote to anxieties about modernity and capitalism” (Martin, 78). Isadora has been corrupted by urban modernity in her divergence from traditional femininity, she is the unmarried spinster, cynical and cruel and without children. Josué is virtuous, recognizes her lack, and pushes her to correct it, which opens her and the audience to emotional growth and frames the return to tradition as virtuous as well. In the end, Isadora must let Josué go to live in tradition with his older brothers, and her “maternal affections are ultimately at the service of the nationalistic cause …[the generation corrupted by neoliberalism must let the future generation transform and return Brazil to tradition] for the sake of the continuation of democratic nationalistic ideologies.” (Gutiérrez-Albilla, 151). Ultimately both Josué and the envisioned Sertão are just symbols to evoke pathos and convince the audience that the historically arid, drought, and starvation entrenched land of the Sertão represents a time that was simpler, and full of possibilities.  

Central Station leaves behind its film roots of Cinema Novo and Italian Neorealism, using the urban Brazilian child as a sympathetic orphan in order to beckon the corrupted Isadora and urban based audiences to a fictional past. The film tries to make a point about the divide between people that’s felt due to the physical distance between the urban migrants and their loved ones back in the Sertão and the emotional distance within urban centers. Josué’s quest to find his father relies solely on making the audience feel emotional, but the lack of an “enemy” or levels of conflict, particularly of recognizing the systems of oppression, means there is no heightening of class consciousness. In contrast, Rio, 100 Degrees F. portrays urban afro-Brazilian children in their everyday lives through a Neorealist and documentary style lens, which includes varied conflict of race and class inequality and leaves the children without adult company to further beckon audiences to form their own conclusions. In this way Rio, 100 Degrees F., a film released 43 years prior, is able to illuminate more about the real structural inequalities facing the urban Brazilian child, than Central Station which uses the Brazilian child to call attention to an economic and moral crisis which is left empty without addressing the most base facts of Brazil’s history and inequality. 



References 

dos Santos, Nelson P., director. Rio, 40 Graus [Rio, 100 Degrees F.]. 1955. 

Salles, Walter, director. Central do Brasil [Central Station]. VideoFilmes, 1998. 

San Miguel, Heliodoro. “Rio, 40 Graus/Rio, 40 Degrees.” In The Cinema of Latin America, edited by Alberto Elena and Marina Díaz López, 2004, pp. 71-79. N.p.: Columbia University Press. EBSCOhost. 

Rebolledo, Felix. “Central do Brasil (Central Station): Coconut Milk with Coca-Cola aftertaste.” Offscreen, vol. 9, no. 6. 2005, https://offscreen.com/view/central_brasil. 

Gutiérrez-Albilla, Julián Daniel. “The Gender Ethics and Politics of Affection: The ‘Feminine’ Melodramatic Mode in Walter Salles’ Central Do Brasil (1998).” Bulletin of Latin American Research, vol. 29, no. 2, 2010, pp. 141–54. 

Bayman, Louis, and Pinazza, Natalia, eds. Directory of World Cinema: Brazil. Bristol: Intellect, Limited, 2014, pp. 258–260. ProQuest Ebook Central. 

Martin, Deborah. “Children’s Journeys: Central Do Brasil, Viva Cuba and Cochochi.” The Child in Contemporary Latin American Cinema, Palgrave Macmillan, 2019, pp. 71–106.