Bus 174 is ,indeed, a difficult film to watch and a complicated documentary to consume as well. Bus 174 critically touches on the question of the ethics and responsibility of social media. In our society, social media serves as a form of propaganda, entertainment, capitalism advertisement, whereas in my opinion, social media should function as a social platform that allows all the social members to rise their voices, and at the same time provides the transparency of how the government and society behave. In this way, Bus 174 clearly and almost painfully challenges the role of social media in Brazil.
By using the real recording of the hijack process and knowing that the entire country was watching on the national television, José Padilha makes us as one of the “audiences” in Brazil on June, 12th, 2000. From the camera, we see how Sandro changing his attitudes through the whole process. In the beginning he was afraid of all the lenses as he noticed the existence of the TV cameras. The cameras made him extremely anxious and desperate. As a result, Sandro tried extremely hard to find something covering himself up in order to escape from the cameras. However, later on he realized that his trying is useless, and he was literally besieged by the TV and broadcasting cameras. Then he gave up hiding and decided to expose himself in front of the cameras (in a very powerful way). He tried to raise his voice and to speak out for the injustice and brutal treating of the street kids and those, as the film defines, who are the invisible people in Brazil. Sandro wanted to break the wall of invisibility and let the society hear their voices by exposing himself in front of the social media.Therefore he spoke about the massacre of the streets kids; he shut out his anger and pain through the cameras hoping that the society could bring him (and the people behind them) a way to live. However the result was totally the opposite. With so many people watching the entire process, it turned out that the only choice society offered him is death. It seems that through social media, Sandro did make himself visible. However, no one knew the true conversation going on in Sandro’s head when he was with the hostages. No one understood Sandro's thinking and his true desire when he hijacked the bus. Because of the media, Sandro had to put on two totally different shows inside and outside of the bus. Therefore, with so many different voices appeared at the end of the film, we never had any chance to listen to Sandro’s true voice. The cameras, in the end, never helped him break the invisible wall. Sandro, with other street kids, was still imprisoned in the invisible cage abandoned by Brazilian society.
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