I would love to know your top 5 0r 10 movies (or more if possible) out there that not only represent a city, country and it's street kids/people who need help but have great cinema human emotional connection as well - be it documentary or fiction based on reality -- whether through acting, writing, cinematography or all 3 -- !!!!!
shareDoes Amores Perros count? I watched it a long time back and I don't remember it well. While it is set in Mexico city, it isn't particularly about the city, and I'm don't know whether it portrays the place accurately.
Oh, and City of God is a great call, should definitely be on that list.
"Los olvidados" (Luis Buñuel)
"Les quatre cents coups" (François Truffaut)
"Born into Brothels" (although this one is a documentary not a feature film)
"De la calle" (Gerardo Tort)
"La haine" (settled in the "1st world" and with teenagers instead little kids, but basically same idea)
Money is better than poverty, if only for financial reasons.
Christiane F (Wir kinder vom bahnof zoo) - a haunting, shocking german film from the early 80's. It's so reflective of time and place, focuses on the street kids, junkies and prostitutes of berlin. Track it down - promise you won't regret it!
sharePixote: A Lei do Mais Fraco (Hector Babenco)
Ali Zaoua, prince de la rue
The Bicycle Thief is a good, depressing Italian movie ... Ladri di biciclette (1948). I was struck how both it and Salaam Bombay ended basically the same way for the protaganist.
shareI love the Japanse film Dare Mo Shiranai (Nobody Knows). It's a fictional story based on a real event in Tokyo and tells the story of four abandoned children in Tokyo.
shareI'd possibly add ' Hoop Dreams' to the list...
shareChandni Bar- a phenomonal Indian film that is so realistic and powerful. Incredible acting, writing, and directing. BRUTALLY real. It individually focuses on one truly good woman's truly atrocious, undeniably completely unfair life. A horrifically beautiful film that I strongly recommend to anyone who loves movies that deal with reality, not a fake world.
Mandragora- an incredible Czech film very similar in style to Salaam Bombay. It also deals with street children, but the children in this film are prostitutes. A haunting nightmare. But it's based directly off of real life events. It's happening now. Too real.
Kids- One of the most painfully powerful films from America. It proves that American films can have actual meaning and depth. Awesome directing, photography, etc. dealing with sex, aids, drugs etc.
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Born into Brothels and City of Joy could come close to Salaam Bombay.
Few others are - City of God, Deliver Us from Evil, Children Underground, Turtles can fly etc.
Watch 'My Flesh and Blood' as well. If that documentary doesn't give you a perspective of life then nothing will...
Traffic Signal is a Bollywood movie along the same lines; IMHO, it is more similar to Salam Bombay than any of the earlier Bollywood movies listed in this thread.
share