Watch CENTRAL STATION (Brasil)

Central Station is an awesome movie. It's not an extraordinary adventure but something we can all find ourselves relating to.

The visual is delightful with its brilliant cinematography. And there are those point-blank still shots that I enjoy so much. The script is full of wit as well, but remains natural when delivered by their characters. The actors, of course, delievered their characters well in that that-seems-to-be-you-in-real-life calibre. And the lovely music! Each background music accompanies its scene perfectly well, conveys just the right mood and stirs the appropriate emotions.

The movie takes place in Brazil. There's Dora the letter writer who writes letters in the central station for those who can't. But she never mails them. She just tears them up. If the letter is any good, she keeps it in a drawer... but never sends it. Wow, what a conscience, eh?

A mother, Ana, and his son, Josue, comes to her to send a letter to the child's father telling him that Josue wants to meet him even though Ana thinks he's the worst person in the world. The letter starts like this: "Jesus, you're the worst thing that happened to my life..... But Josue, your son, wants to see you." (I was like, What? Some people address letters to Jesus too?) Irene, Dora's neighbor and friend who joins her in reading and tearing the letters, tells Dora she should send it. She manages to persuade Dora just enough to let Dora keep the letter in her drawer. The next day, the mother and Josue comes back to send another letter telling the father, Jesus, that they want to be with him again.

But as Ana and Josue were walking out the station, Ana gets hit by a bus. And dies.

The next few days, Dora sees Josue around the station. Until she decides, after a number of days, to bring the now-homeless kid home. There Josue meets Irene and finds out that Dora never sends the letter she writes for other people.

Dora sends Josue to a "juvenile center," which is actually an agency that sells kids' vital organs to people in other countries. From this, Dora gets $1000, which she uses to buy a remote-controlled TV. Irene finds out and tells Dora that she needs to get Josue back. Eventually, Dora goes back and steals Josue away from the evil child splicers.

And then they embark on a journey way south of Rio (Bum Josu or something) to find Josue's father. What follows is a series of funny, emotional, annoying, heart-wrenching etc sequences, from bus stop to bus stop, truck to truck and pilgrimage towns to another. They lose money, run out of money, gets stuck in a truck full of pilgrims, Dora meets a truck driver who she falls in love with (but this doesn't go on for more than 4 scenes, really), blablabla. Do they find Jesus, Josue's dad, or not? Just watch the damn thing to find out. And Jesus sent Ana a letter 6 months ago.

In one bus ride scene, Josue tries to get a drink out of the bottle of wine Dora bought in one of their stops, while Dora was asleep. And of course, he takes more than one gulp. Next thing you know, Dora wakes to find an empty seat, and empty wine bottle, beside her plus a drunk kid at the back of the bus, yelling, "My name is Josue de Fontanel Pavia. Fontanel from my mother, and Pavia from my father."

Ending is happy and partly heart-breaking at the same time.