TRASH

His TRASH (2014) has a title that works on more than one level, referring not only to discarded objects but also to people cast aside by society. Told from the perspective of young people, the film tackles distinctly adult concerns, with endemic corruption chief among them, all within a blend of crime drama, thriller and adventure.

On a vast rubbish dump on the outskirts of Rio de Janeiro, fourteen-year-old Raphael (Rickson Tevez), one of society’s outcasts, makes a living sifting through mountains of waste. One day, he finds a wallet containing a few banknotes, some documents and photographs, a key to a locker at a railway station and a string of numbers that turns out to be part of a much larger puzzle. When the police come looking for the missing wallet – and make it clear they are not above using violence – Raphael realises he has stumbled onto something serious.

Together with his best friends Gardo (Eduardo Luís) and Rato (Gabriel Weinstein), he sets off through Rio’s favelas to find out what is really going on. Along the way, they get help from a local priest (Martin Sheen) and a volunteer (Rooney Mara). Drawing on its mix of genres, Daldry tells a story about inequality and violence while creating a vividly coloured, dirt-streaked and relentlessly kinetic fable whose metaphors remain simple and easy to read.

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Text: Rafał Glapiak