O Rap do Pequeno Príncipe Contra as Almas Sebosas (2000) - full transcript

My name is Hélio José Muniz
Filho [Junior], 21 years old

My mother's name is Maria José Muniz

My father is José Muniz

My brothers are Ed José Muniz,

Juarez Muniz,
Edmar José de Santana

Five men and five women

Ten siblings

I'm José Alexandre
dos Santos de Oliveira

I'm 27 years old and I'm the
son of João Francisco de Oliveira

and Maria José Santos de Oliveira

I'm married with
Fabiana Cristina de Oliveira



I'm the father of Luís Vinicius Lima
de Oliveira and Tiago Filipe de Oliveira

My brothers are André Luís de Oliveira,
José Alexandre Santos de Oliveira,

Ana Emanuel and Assis Aurélio

I'm the drummer of the band
Faces do Subúrbio [Faces of the Suburbs]

Born and raised in Camaragide

I was coming from the center, in Recife

I had to buy the christmas
and new years clothes

5:30 in the afternoon I crossed a bridge

Named Balde,
that was weird and eerie as fuck

On the middle of the bridge I crossed a
guy, André Coveiro [Coveiro = Gravedigger]

Ahead there...

were two guys I knew

They noticed me
and I continued walking

But just ahead there was
a guy named Paulo Estane



And he pointed a gun at me

Told me to take my clothes off,
I was left in underpants

He took my money, I had
120.000 reais to send to my kid

So he left me in underpants
and I came back home desperate

Six months passed

I think this guy
had fucked with Hélio too,

he shot his brother-in-law

He whipped him out

Hélio told him
to say the lord's prayer,

the moment he said "Father", pow

I had only heard of him

He was also...

from a poor neighbourhood

A place called Detran

He had done some bullshit there
and then came to live in Camaragide

He involved himself
with some people there

That were killing the criminals in town

"...I got nervous,
I had never killed anyone..."

He got up,
that boy is going out, right?

Then a colleague came, I only heard the
voice, but I didn't recognize who it was

He came in,
put on a shirt and went out

I said "for the love of god,
the victim is..."

No, I'm going

He went away

A mother can tell when a
son has something going on

But she couldn't take it
or maybe she didn't see it

She didn't see it or didn't appear to

I did my stuff on the streets
and I didn't show it at home

Got really scared, put two revolvers
under the pillow and went to sleep

When I checked
it was 3 in the morning

I told them "Is this
any time to get home,"

"they're killing
everyone out there"

and they told me it happened
just around the corner

They told me "They didn't kill
Boca, they didn't kill him"

and I thought "Did he die?"

"Could it be that he's alive?"
So I went there to check

Left for work in the morning

I saw the body there

That was when it blew up

By mistake I told some people that...

I shouldn't have told them,

I was letting off steam,
but I shouldn't have said it

The word spread

Eventually it gets to these guys

It started a war

They all wanted to kill me

and I wanted to kill them

That's when I started:
I killed one, then another

Ran away,
my name started circulating

Gang leader dead, gang fights,

that stuff started
turning up on the radio

"Life as it is."

"Cartinou, the truth-teller."

"The 29th!"

"A young man was found dead
in the courtyard of a house in Piedade."

"That man of around 25 years old
is known as Didinho..."

"...Resident in Rua da paz"...
[Peace Street]

"Cardinou Show:
Who doesn't react, crawls"

João Veiga Filho, special
delegate of the Capital Police

The information I have is...

that he has killed 44 people

As has been declared by local media
- written, spoken and televised

You have to kill not to die

If I hadn't taken the lives
of so many bad people,

many innocent could have died

I believe no one has
the right to take another's life

But just the idea of someone getting out
the house early in the morning

Spending the whole month
working to get 130000 reais

Just so that some motherfucker
points a gun at you

And takes your shoes,
all your money

Percussion has been here
from the start,

people used it to communicate

And you usually
always connect rhythms,

to Africa, Cuba,
Nicaragua, Guatemala

People use it all the time

Percussion is the basis of
everything, like education

We clean the city,
we remove the wicked souls

Thieves, robbers, drug dealers

TV...

I don't like TV much,
it's not my cup of tea

I see some action films,
that Steven Seagal -

man, there's no stopping him

That guy is cool as fuck

I wish I could do that,
but he never dies, right?

But me, I die, you know?

We want to show people
what goes on everyday

We want to show our real life

We want to be able
to go to radio,

to the television,
and tell it like it is

More people will get informed

We're here to conquer
the space that is ours by right

It's the sound of the periphery

It's music as a rescue,
an awareness-raising sound

That speaks the truth
without mincing words

Of what happens everyday in this
context, the reality of the favela

And few bands do this in Brazil,
you can count them by the fingers

But it's getting more common
and I think that's the way to go

It's no use glossing over
what's been happening all over,

including here in Pernambuco

Brazillian rap was created
in Pernambuco, I think

Even the pioneer of the
brazillian hip hop movement,.

a guy called Nelson Triunfo

That lives in São Paulo, is from
the city of Triunfo in Pernambuco.

And rap, it has the rhythmic cadence
as the Embolada [brazilian genre]

if you put it into the
Embolada it works fine.

If you do it the other way around,
you can sing it normally too.

"Pay attention, wicked soul..."

"...we'll be telling the truth,
even if you're not listening..."

"...because there's so many wicked souls,
we can't take it no more..."

"...they're our friends on the front,
but enemies on our back..."

"...it's not enough
that they don't help us..."

"...they'll do anything to hinder us..."

"...so Faces do Subúrbio doesn't
turn you the other cheek..."

"...and if we get hit,
be assured you'll get it back..."

"...so learn the message
you're receiving now..."

"...respect the music
coming from the streets."

Wicked souls... we'll clarify to you

Wicked souls are those who
are worthless, inutile, indigent

"I'm not playing when I spit..."

"...and I won't be there for
the wicked souls' blight..."

"...and their calculated regrets..."

"...because your behaviour
doesn't lead anywhere..."

"...flirting with the women
of your fellow man..."

"...speaking ill behind
your back all the time..."

"...far from good deeds..."

"...getting damaged for sure..."

"...insisting wholly
on a path of mischief..."

"...you have no dignity,
you're always negative..."

"...no self love even,
so you stay idle..."

"...grow up from your bullshit,
listen to what I say..."

"...and I've got my eyes
on your woman too."

"Wicked souls, wicked souls,
we can't take it anymore!"

He is a wicked soul.

My son, for the love of god,
stop that...

It's a life

But they take one life, then
take another, then another one steals

They have to die.

"Wicked souls, wicked souls,
we can't take it anymore!"

I don't like to use
that expression because...

that way of talking, "wicked soul",
that's a low-life expression

It's an expression used between outcasts

And as an authority, I think what
they mean as a "wicked soul"

are people who have a lesser-than-perfect
conduct, a rascal, and so on

but I'm not a psychologist,
neither a political scientist, nor...

a person that
is in the care of these people,

except when I'm exercising
my position in the delegation.

If he thought it fit to call
those people wicked souls

That was his way of expressing himself

But I'd never refer to the people
he murdered as wicked souls,

They were human beings
just like the rest of us.

I got the nickname
of "Little Prince"

because I was working
as security in a bar

And a guy there gave me that
name because everyone liked me.

I thought, "the Little Prince",
that's good, right?

It must come from
some of his acquaintances,

and I don't know any of them

I'm getting to know now
lots of people that come visit him

that I didn't know before

And I see him being
very esteemed by these people,

albeit his fame

They really do appreciate him.

People think of Camaragide
as a very idle city

People arrive here and they see
the population still in the fairs,

sitting

It's a city of dorms,
it has no jobs

People only go there to sleep and
work in Recife and other cities

And so it's a rough place
for opportunities,

it offers no opportunities
for the youth

It's like a closed circuit,
small businesses,

only few people work there

"...operating on the frequency 104,5 for
the cultural development of Camaragide,

Pernambuco, Brasil."

"After the incarceration of
Helinho [Hélio] in January of 1998...

a petition was created
demanding his release."

"Hundreds of people signed the document
that was given to the authorities."

"We, the residents of
these neighbourhoods,

call on the authorities for the
release of Hélio José Moniz..."

"...a person of our trust..."

"...protector of our community,
which before Hélio's intervention..."

"...lived tormented by robberies,
vandalism and more."

"After Hélio came
to live in our town,"

"we achieved peace..."

"...so the presence of
this man in our community"

"was 100% beneficial
to our lives."

"We ask then the authorities that
the aforementioned be released..."

"...so that he may
join his community"

"and free the mothers,
fathers and children..."

"...of the delinquency and
vandalism around them."

"Thus,
we leave here our petition."

I don't think that's right.

Because people
are supporting this person,

who claims to be a vigilante

And are undersigning a petition

Giving him,

as you've mentioned in your question,
the description of a "good person"

Do you believe that a man,

that kills this amount of people,
can be a "good person"?

We are not living the times of
Lampião [notorious brazilian bandit]

Nor of António Silvino
[another one]

What we're seeing happen today

Is lots of killers, robbers.

They've forsaken god

They're killing each other for fun

You look at one of them,
they say "What are you looking at?"

And soon enough
they're killing each other

You must have been following
the latest news

Hundreds of thousands
of crimes of all natures

We've noticed
lots of rapes recently

Robberies too, which
leaves us all terribly afraid

Who is happy when this happens
to someone of their family?

You need look at this
from all sides

My name is Ana Clarice
Almeida, I'm 25 years old

And I'm a photo reporter
for the Pernambuco Paper

It's very odd to say this,
but I like death

I find the inside of the
body to be very interesting

It's very odd to be
saying this, but I like it

There isn't much way to explain it

I could like taking pictures
of flowers, but no

...I used to carry him to bed!

I've seen mothers leaning on
their sons screaming "wake up!"

Holding tight to them

Crying for their sons,
covered in blood, dead

Seeing that is a shock, really

Much more than a 12mm shot
to the head, this is fucked up

This hurts, it's a weird feeling

It makes me feel
a sort of mother's love

Our constitution says
we are all equal in the eyes of the law

Regardless of gender or race

It's true
that our country is big and rich

But unfortunately not always
are our resources well used

Because of that we
have grave social problem

We see poverty, slums

I think 80 or 90% of our population
is of a disadvantaged class

And because of that,

since they have
less access to information,

They also have a harder time
getting justice for themselves

Because if they have no
knowledge of their own rights

How are they gonna look for something
they don't know they're entitled to have?

My name is Eduardo Trindade,
I'm 26 years old.

I'm a criminal defense lawyer,
on the job for 2 years and a half now

I think education in Brasil
hasn't been a priority

Education is lacking,
it's the basis of everything

I want to change my community,
I want to change

The concept of
society within the people

The way of thinking,
the way of living

The will to
take the kids off the streets

To spread the knowledge I've
had from my suffering of... of...

"Cardinou Show:
Who doesn't react, crawls"

"And Cardinou
is just arriving to you..."

"It's 11:29"

"Things are looking ugly today"

"Cardinou stays with you now,
I'll be back tomorrow,"

"right after
the Cardinou Show! Bye, y'all!"

"I'm accompanied by José Itamar
Ferreira da Silva, 53 years old..."

"Miss Vera Lúcia Marques de Sousa
and Paulo Roberto de Sousa."

"Yesterday morning,
the salesman José Itamar"

"went into the town of Caruaru
to make a delivery of handbags..."

"When they
were leaving the town,"

"they were detained
by the military police..."

...they were stopped by the MP!"

"They were accused
of robbery, theft!"

"They were accused of robbing a woman
in a neighbouring town of Caruaru!"

If they hit my wife,
I'd flip out in there

And my wife wasn't
understanding what was going on

That's when someone came
and ordered her to stand up

Then he told them to pull
her hair to see if it was a wig

Who pulled your hair?

The cop.

Civil or military police?

Was he in uniform
or painclothes?

Uniform

Plainclothes,
it was the one that came after

The one that
pulled your hair and back

He told me "Stand up"
and I said "No problem"

Okay, okay, but don't
stand up here! Talk to the microphone

He told me "You will suffer"
and he told my husband he will too

I told them
I wouldn't take that treatment!

You were going to get beaten!

Delegate José António!

"Hello Cardinou!"

What a disgrace, delegate!

"Complete!"

Now will this case be
analyzed by the internal affairs?

"I don't quite believe it..."

There's no way around it!

The people of the delegation
may start their sleepless nights!

Try and sleep
with a scandal such as this!

It's all going to
the Internal Affairs

What's this business of pulling
a woman's hair left and right?

What a load of bullshit, is that
any way for a police officer to behave?

Do you know
what this is about, delegate?

That's because,

if you didn't have your certificate
of being a police delegate...

You'd be locked up too!

And that's because
you are black and he is too!

That's racism!
It's because he's black!

When will this stop in Brasil?

People are growing up now

Because of rap,
conscious artists

They're passing through a
message and people are adhering to it

Before you'd see lots of
youngsters just loafing around

Now you have lots of smart kids,

they don't believe in
everything they hear

They decide not to go party
on Carnival, to save the money

The dumber we get,
the more we lose our money

There's lots of people taking advantage
of each other, it's in our culture

Since Africa it's been like that:
people selling people

Sailing them
across the world for slavery

So people don't trust
each other, it's in our blood

If I do a favour to someone, he's afraid
of what I'm looking to get from them

"He's giving me lots of
compliments... Helping me out..."

When the hand-out is too big,
even a saint is skeptical -

now which country's
that proverb from?

But it's hard

The guys we're dealing with
are intelligent

They are the ones creating
this anger, this hate, this war

They create this situation

For them it's all good,
they're eating meat everyday

It's the third year in a row

this is considered the
most dangerous place on earth

There's lots of different neighbourhoods
next to each other here in the south

There where's that white house
is another one,

on the other side it's São Luís,

and up there is Santo António

And here it's Alto do Brasil...

"I'm gonna spit some wisdom to my
people on the other side of the wall..."

"...They can never
chain our thoughts..."

"...Listen up people from..."
[enumerating several brazilian cities]

"And for all the allies spread
through all the favelas in Brasil..."

"...All the DJs and MCs that
make rap the sound of the ghetto."

"And for all the motherfuckers
that wanna cut my head off..."

"...Try your luck."

"I believe in the word of
the dark-skinned man..."

"...of curly hair, that walked
between beggars and leppers..."

"...preaching equality."

"A man named Jesus."

"Only him knows when my time's come."

"Peace."

Sunday there's a gathering

Hélio used to do these events too

There's the usual game, every
neighbourhood has a football field

That's basically it,

there's forró [music genre],
lotto, football and baile funk

And that's enough

It's different

There you can't see
your friends all the time

Or your family

There you have no freedom of expression

Out here I have the right
to express myself

They're citizens still

They've got their hands
tied, you've got rules there

If you screw up, you're dead

When people visit me

It's like a party, everyone is happy

My family, my wife, my friends

It's a party that for me
only happens on sunday

He cries

"Mother, if I had heard
your advice, I wouldn't be here"

He cries

When I leave, he cries again

There's days that I get
there and he's stressed out

I've been carrying some
pills for him to calm down

Then he gets playful and talks

When it's time to say goodbye he gets...

He cries, I cry too

He wasn't a bad son

Then I think, he was lots of work

But that's how it is

A mother raises their sons
and you don't know how they turn out

They grow up and then they change

He followed that path

It was weakness or
evil character, I don't know

Or his nerves

It's a violent passion

Coming to the stadium
to support your team

When they score a goal,
it's orgasmic

Y'know, we cheer for them

Really dying for them to score

When they do,
it's just like an orgasm

Lots of joy

I'll share

A bit of Brazil's history
that's been written recently

Another part of Brazil's history

I usually say Brazil will still need
500 years more to turn into a nation

Y'know?

Because Brazil is a giant ghetto

No one gets here
by their own will

They have to taken by force

Believe it or not

I'll share a passage from Brazil's
history that's been written recently

It was written in blood

Blood of people just like you

São Paulo

The 1st of october

Of 1992

8 o'clock in the morning

"Here I am once again..."

"...under the bloodthirsty gaze
of the lookout..."

"...you don't know what it's like to
walk with an HK aiming at your head..."

"...german or israelite
machine-gun..."

"...shreds thieves
as if they're paper..."

"...standing up on the wall,
another good citizen..."

"...serving the Estate, a good MP..."

"...he starves, looking
like Charles Bronson..."

"...he knows what I want..."

"...knows my every thought..."

"...the day is cloudy,
the mood is tense..."

"...many tried to escape,
I also want to..."

"...but from 1 to 100, my odds are 0..."

"...could have god heard my prayers?..."

"...could the judge have
heard my appeal?..."

"...send a message to my brother..."

"...if you're doing drugs,
we ain't good..."

"...he's still hanging
with that chick..."

"...believe me, they're fine people..."

"...I took an extra day off,
or one less..."

"...whatever,
the days are all the same..."

"...I light a cigarette and
watch the day go by..."

"...killing time,
so he doesn't kill me back..."

"...a man is a man,
a woman is a woman..."

"...a rapist is different
though, right?..."

"...gets beat up all the time..."

"...get on your knees
and kiss my feet..."

"...bleed to death on 10th St..."

"...for every prisoner,
a mother, a belief..."

"...for every crime, a sentence..."

"...every sentence,
a motive, a story of tears..."

"...blood, lives and glory,
neglect, misery, hate..."

"...suffering, contempt,
disillusionment, time's passing..."

"...get all that mixed together..."

"...and you get another prisoner..."

"...regrets on the corridor,
the cell, the yard..."

"...all around the place,
in every corner..."

"...but I know the system, my man..."

"...there're no saints here..."

"...ratatata..."

Article 12

Robbery, article 157

The sentence varies from 4 to 10 years

Having the possibility of a
third or half the time added

In case of violence and threats

Or in the case of there being
two people or more involved in the crime

And it can go from 5 to 15 years

If there are
injuries to the victims

Bank robbers

They go to
the best pavilions in the prison

That only have people with money

So no one can harm them

They get only the best

Now, a thief with a small crime

Gets lots of shit in jail,
they don't get respect

Rape

Article 213 of the Penal Code

6 to 10 years

A rapist

Before he gets to jail

The police are the first to
tell everyone a pervert is coming

And that's worse than
killing your mother or father

All the depravities you can imagine

They do it to him

If you want to stick
your dick in his mouth,

Gangbang him even, he has to do it

Our Penal Code states
the sentence for homicide

In the case of second
degree murder, 6 to 20 years

In the case of first
degree murder, 12 to 30 years

Article 121

The vigilante

The police gives him importance

But the inmates don't

They don't care about
locked up vigilantes

With anyone like him
it's on sight

Anyone who kills
one of ours in the streets

Has to die

Lots of people have tried to
kill me since I got here

But some people have opened my eyes

They've taught me how it is in prison

Some say hell is beneath the earth

But they're wrong, hell is up here

Man, Recife is awesome

According to statistics, it's the
fourth worst city in the world to live in

But I really want to
know what's the best city

There's still lots to know in here

We're still discovering
much of Recife

And the region

And it's the best
in regards to music

Lots of people
discovering our worth

The music
that I'm talking about is rap

It's rhythm and poetry

Marginal poetry

Marginal rhythm too,
coming from the periphery

Speaking the truth

Even if it hurts

We speak to whoever will listen

To blacks, whites,
the poor, indigenous

To Asians

To homosexuals, bikers, skaters

[Faces do Subúrbio -
Críticas e Críticas]

We did something

When, y'know... they killed...

We went into a crack house

The people that passed us

Those that we saw
with a cap, or a tattoo

Or with those shorts

We knew it

We were nervous, we were angry

One of hours had been killed

And we knew the killer was an outsider

We knew he was a wicked one

That day,
there were 7 of us killing him

But now I'll tell you something

I used to tell my brother

We can't have that prejudice

Just because someone has
a tattoo to go and kill them

We have to conscious about this!

Having tattoos doesn't make you a thief

Wearing a cap doesn't make you a thief

I can wear it, my dad can wear it

Would I kill my father
because he has a tattoo?

And you have to know,
nowadays thieves don't have tattoos

Nor do they have earrings

They're getting smarter

Thieves now look fancy

They look better than a businessman

We take Hélio for example

Hélio can be saved

Like Malcom X, he used
to be a drug dealer, a thief

A pimp, and more

When he got to jail,
he started reading the Quran

The Sacred Bible of muslims

And he turned into
one of the great leaders worldwide

He save the citizenship

And social rights
of the black community in USA

Luther King always defended
pacifism for human rights

To grant black men the
same rights of the white men

The right to use a bus,
the right to go to school

The right to have a dignified city

Health and education

And Che was the strategist
of the cuban revolution

I got tattoos of them because
they're part of world history

They're part of my history

If it wasn't for Che,
Malcom X, Luther King

I wouldn't be here
standing up for my race

I wouldn't be defending
the rights of the brazilian proletariat

Namely the proletariat
of Camaragide in Pernambuco

As wrong as it may be,
they're a son

A father, a brother

I feel for them

I know they must hate me

I don't know,
they do, don't they?

Knowing that I'm his mother

So they must hate me

But I forgive them,
because I'm a mother too

I don't want anyone
to kill him for what he's done

They must feel the same

They're mothers

When I knew of any of it,
I always felt bad

I got sick, my pressure went up

He told "you're gonna have a fever"

But a mother is a mother

No matter what

A mother doesn't want
to get those news

I don't want that for you

What mother does?

No matter how bad it gets,
it's a mother, an uncle, a nephew

I never supported this

I always tried to oppose him, but

There was no way around it

It splits me

I'm a mother

And I also have a big connection
with god, I have faith

By the law of god, those
who do wrong, must pay, right?

He hasn't payed anything yet

All the suffering he brought

But since he's young

Did that under influence of others

Of this world
that is all about destroying

The people of this world
only want to destroy

So god might have mercy on him

May others
learn a lesson with his mistakes

And not repeat his actions

He believed himself to be a hero

Able to manage the world

People managing people,
it doesn't work like that

You can't fix it like that

God didn't fix it and he won't

God is the only one in control

God

Bless my people

God, bless everyone

"Greetings to the
suffering people of the north..."

"...the destined people,
the brave people..."

"...may god bless you all..."

"...tramps, beggars,
precariously kept in tribulations..."

"...wrong and disregarded
northern people..."

"...regarded as unnecessary..."

"...with validated assholes
mocking our accents..."

"...people that
face many difficulties..."

"...they fight hard
and even punch, and rightly so..."

"...their courage and determination..."

"...prolong their confidence
in their strong fists..."

"...calloused hands, sweat
runs through worn out bodies..."

"...but they don't quit and continue..."

"...through their path..."

"...unpleasant situations
pile up everyday..."

"...and they suffer
without help..."

"...how could they
have the life they wanted?..."

"...victims without blame..."

"...they're in the hands
of precarity..."

"...but everyone needs money..."

"...a roof, clothes, food,
water, health is necessary..."

"...these are all
commonplace topics for the poor..."

"...and for the rich
it's inverted..."

"...new problems arise,
making day to day even harder..."

"...It's a damn shame..."

"...in each ghetto,
in each poor-stricken home,"

"there'll always be worries..."

"...we need a dignified life,
but it's impossible..."

"...the poor suffer
as if it were a commitment..."

"...magnates work for this..."

"...the more miserable we live..."

"...them and their riches
become invincible, I tell you..."

"...they're invincible, I tell you..."

"...god! Bless my people!..."

"...god! Bless everyone..."

"...god! Bless my people!..."

"...god! Bless everyone..."

If we die,
someone else will come

That's the problem,
it never ends

And it's the same everywhere

Every wicked soul you kill,
two or three are born

On that very same spot

You can't win

It's a great battle

Mischief starts with one
but always ends with ten

If I kill one,
I've got to kill them all

If you let two or three
live and get together

They'll meet others even worse

They'll form a group

They'll want to avenge the death
of the other one that died

If you had to create a place

A good place to live

It's like that John Lennon song,
"Imagine all"

Just "imagine" I think

He died because of that song

It's the same for us, we can't just
imagine, we have to make it happen

Hélio José Muniz Filho,
or Helinho,

was tried and sentenced
to a total of 99 years in prison.

In march of 2000, Helinho
is in a prison in Recife,

awaiting trial for
other charges of homicide.

Alexandre Garnizé is developing
a cultural and educational project

with young people in Camaragide.

In march of 2000,

Garnizé is working on the release of
Faces do Subúrbio's second album -

a group of rap in
which he's the drummer.