quase dois irmăos (almost brothers) (2004), directed by lúcia murat, follows the lifelong friendship of two men, miguel (werner schünemann) from a wealthy, white neighborhood and jorge (antónio pompeo), a black favela-dweller who meet growing up in rio de janeiro in the 1950s, as a consequence of their fathers' shared love of samba. 

the two men who become respectively an upper-middle class politician and a drug lord from rio's slums find themselves reconnecting in ilha grande maximum security prison in the 1970s during the military dictatorship when miguel is incarcerated as a political prisoner and guerrilla activist, and his friend jorge imprisoned for robbery.

the film which jumps mainly between the 70s and the present day tracks in parallel the men's complex friendship and the social and cultural transformation of rio de janeiro through the eyes of both the middle class of the time and the socially excluded.