Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #2383 in DVD
• Released on: 2004-04-01
• Rating: Suitable for 15 years and over
• Aspect ratio: 2.35:1
• Number of discs: 1
• Formats: PAL, Widescreen
• Original language: German, Portuguese
• Number of discs: 1
• Running time: 106 minutes

Amazon.co.uk Review
In the opening scenes of Central Station, colourful crowds of Brazilians stream into and out of a Rio de Janeiro train, pushing through doors and windows. You're immediately pulled into the brutal vitality of a nation in motion, setting the tone for a picturesque road movie that charts Brazil's renaissance in a little boy's search for his father and an old woman's emotional reawakening. When we first meet Dora (Fernanda Montenegro), this frozen-hearted, sour-faced woman is the epitome of immobility: day after day, she sits in the train station selling her letter-writing skills to all comers, but often doesn't bother to mail these precious messages. When a woman who's paid Dora to write a pleading note to her son's long-missing dad gets run over by a bus, the child, Josue (Vinicius de Oliveira), is up for grabs. (The summary execution of a thieving street kid--seen in longshot--underscores the seriousness of this waif's plight.) After an abortive attempt to sell Josue for a new TV, the aspiring couch potato finds herself reluctantly propelled into an occasionally Fellini-esque odyssey through the hinterlands of Brazil's sertäo, where Dora and her sidekick find unexpected faith and family. Former documentary filmmaker Walter Salles (Foreign Land) mixes magic with realism in his appreciation of striking faces and places, but Central Station is primarily fuelled by the tough/tender performances of Montenegro, Brazil's Judi Dench, and de Oliveira, an airport shoeshine boy Salles cast over 1,500 other hopefuls. (Montenegro was nominated for a Best Actress Oscar, and Central Station was in the running for Best Foreign Language Film.) No cloyingly cute child-star, de Oliveira plays Josue as a bracingly idiosyncratic brat. And watching Dora's face and soul slowly, unwillingly unclench as she gets back in motion--and emotion--is potent pleasure, even if Salles' trip does dead-end in soap opera as his Brazilian pilgrim's progress winds down. --Kathleen Murphy, Amazon.com

DVD Description
Languages: Dolby Surround Sound 2.0: Portuguese
Subtitles: English, English for the hearing impaired
Widescreen Format : 2.35:1

Synopsis
Fernanda Montenegro's affecting performance, nominated for a Best Actress Oscar, is the centerpiece in this acclaimed Brazilian film. In the bustling heart of Rio de Janeiro, a young boy, Josue (Vinicius De Olivera), witnesses the accidental death of his mother. When a lonely letterwriter (Montenegro) reluctantly agrees to care for the boy, they begin a journey across the countryside on which they learn valuable lessons about each other and the human spirit.

Customer Reviews

Hollywood could never do this film
This is brilliant. That's the only way to describe it, and even that doesn't do it justice.
Dora, cynic teacher retirée, writes letters for the illiterate people of her home city, Rio di Janiro, but most of the time reads the letters with her neighbour and apparently sole friend, Irine, before ripping them up and throwing them out, or stashing them in a drawer Irine refers to as Purgatory. Due to unfortunate circumstances, a small boy by the name of Josué falls under her care, and after unknowingly selling him, she gets him back, and they go on a "Sideways"/"Transamerica" type journey to find the boys father.
Hollywood could never do this film: It's far to human, real, and emotional. Not wishing to give too much away here, but this was the first and only film I have ever cried at in my life. Well worth your viewing time and money.

A Triumph Of The Human Spirit
Fernanda Montenegro's portrayal of the cynic and harsh Dora, that befriends an orphan boy and realises that Love has many ways of coming back into one's life is absolutely magical and real. Few, if any, actresses would achieve such a feat. She moulds her face, her whole body, to the evolution of her relationship with the boy Josué, with the landscape of hinterland Brazil, with Faith that she has lost for Gods and Saints but recovers towards the end of the film as something far more complex - faith in humanity. She's probably the Best Actress in the world at this moment. The cinematography is breathtaking, the soundtrack absolutely right, and the supporting cast (particularly Marília Pera) a delight to see. It beats me why Fernanda didn't win the Oscar, and it's a scandal that the clownish Life Is Beautiful stole Central Station its Foreign Language Oscar as well... Still, anyone who chances watching this film will see it for the universal masterpiece of film making it is. Superb!

Truly unforgettable!
This is a truly wonderful and heart rending film, which celebrates the survival of the human condition in even the hardest of environments.

The central themes of this film are loss, loneliness and longing for love. These themes are omnipresent in the film; in the words of the poor, illiterate souls whose letters Dora will never send; in young Josue, who has lost his mother and longs to find his missing father; in the evangelist truck driver, who finds solace from the loneliness of the open road in his religious faith; and in Dora and Irene, retired schoolteachers living alone as spinsters.

Fernando Montenegro's outstanding portrayal of the bitter and cynical Dora captivates right from the beginning. Movement is centrifugal to the film, such as the passing of the daily trains and commuters through Rio station; Josue angrily chasing the train carrying Dora early in film, and vainly running after the bus taking Dora back to Rio at the end of the film.

Dora's hoarding of the unsent letters in her flat unconsciously reflects the lack of resolution in her own life, which has led to her being querulous and dissatisfied in old age. In spite of many stops and starts, she finds resolution, and restoration of her faith in humanity, through the journey which introduces Josue to his brothers and leaves him with the hope of seeing his errant father. The film ends poignantly with Dora writing a letter to Josue, on her bus journey back to Rio, telling him never to forget her as he embarks on the long journey of life.