BPK60A “Prisoners in Courtyard Carandiru” Sony Pictures Year: 2003 Brazil / Argentina Director: Hector Babenko. Image shot 21 March 2003. Exact date unknown. “Carandiru” is a 2003 Brazilian drama film directed by Héctor Babenco. It tells stories of life in Carandiru Penitentiary, which was the biggest prison in Latin America, and culminates with the 1992 massacre of 111 prisoners, 102 by police. Part of a new kind of Brazilian realism inspired by Cinema Novo, the film relied on the memoir, Estação Carandiru by Dr. Drauzio Varella, a physician and AIDS specialist who worked on location, and the experiences of actual prisoners, who were cast in the on-location filming. As such, Carandiru can be viewed as a testimony from the prisoners themselves about the massacre, and prison conditions in Brazil more generally.