FERNANDO MEIRELLES - Director

Fernando Meirelles, director of 'City of God' and 'The Constant Gardener,' reveals that his career in film was not planned but born from childhood exposure to amateur cinema and a pivotal moment in architecture school when he saw a forbidden documentary about Brazil’s Amazon. He describes smuggling the first portable video cameras into Brazil during a military dictatorship, founding a production company that won early video festivals, and using that momentum to transition into commercials—where he learned the grammar of storytelling under pressure. His breakthrough came when he made a tiny test film called 'Golden Gate' to prepare for 'City of God,' using real favela youth as non-actors after a four-month improvisational workshop. The film’s raw, documentary-like style emerged from rejecting traditional continuity and embracing chaos in editing. Meirelles confesses that he once quit filmmaking after the exhausting, soul-crushing promotional tour for 'The Constant Gardener,' only to be pulled back by a serendipitous call about adapting José Saramago’s 'Blindness.' He reflects on the emotional toll of directing, the power of improvisation, and the importance of trusting the process—even when it means shooting entire scenes without a script, letting actors create their own lines in real time.