As the fifth-largest city in the world, São Paulo may seem too large and diverse to encapsulate in roughly 90 minutes of documentary film, but director César Paes comes impressively close in Saudade Do Futuro. Paes' ostensible topic is the Nordestinos, Brazilians who leave the country's drought-afflicted, impoverished northern regions and move south to the city, where they often encounter prejudice and further unemployment. But while the director does focus on individual Nordestinos, ranging from a former mayor of São Paulo to a pair of unemployed buskers, he chooses not to identify them by name, occupation, area of origin, or any other point of reference. He simply shows them in their natural habitats: the mayor giving a speech at a school, the singers drawing crowds in a market and a park, a radio-show host in his studio, and so forth. Some of these subjects do briefly identify themselves, and do speak about their Nordestino heritage, their experiences in the city, or the families they left behind. But Paes seems to prefer them as near-anonymous icons, part of the environment of the big city, which he documents lovingly in his broad-ranging scenes of São Paulo life. Sometimes, he seems to be playing tourist, looking for random interesting sights such as the barely clothed men and women sporting thongs, angel wings, and body paint, distributing leaflets to drivers waiting for a light to change. At other times, he plays cultural reporter, particularly in documenting the Nordestinos' expressions of saudade, an emotionally loaded Portuguese word that encompasses nostalgia, longing, joy, and hope. The images and moods vary widely, but they're all tied together by sound cues, particularly of the Nordestinos' many styles of music, and especially a chanted, improvised form called repente. In the film's most infectiously involving scenes, the repentistas extemporize rhyming couplets about themselves, the audience watching them, and even the invisibly observing filmmakers. They insult each other, sometimes obscenely, or challenge each other to creative duels, or describe their saudade. Paes captures it all, observing without intruding, even refusing to add narration to his final product. The result could be more informative, but it could hardly be more effective. His subjects' joy, sorrow, frustration, and humor speak volumes.