How does mise-en-scene and sound in City Of God generate meaning and response?

The opening of 'City Of God' generates meaning and response straight away in it's opening shot. The opening shot is a close up of a knife being sharpen, which immediately implies that living in Brazil is dangerous and you are living on a knife's edge. The editing also reflects what it is like to live in Brazil in this time period, because there are quick cuts, this means that Brazil is fast, lively and eventful, there's always something going on. Later on in the scene, with a series of quick cuts, we see a chicken try to escape from the 'hoodlums', which is a metaphor for every character in the film because they are all trying to escape from the favela, however like the chicken, they can't escape from the favela and the crimes which happen there. In addition to this, because the chicken is a metaphor, it shows the characters have an animistic side to them, largely because they are all trapped in the favelas and can't escape it. It's also interesting that in the film's opening scene, we are identifying  with the chicken then the film's main characters. There is then a 360 degree shot which shows Rocket in between the hoodlums and the police. This shot shows the clear conflict of not just the film, but also what real people have to live with in the favellas and that's the conflict between the police and the hoodlums. It's also like the film is visually showing us that Rocket has a choice to make, he can either choose the police and fight against crime or choose the hoodlum and commit crimes. There's then a straight cut during the 360 degree shot to Rocket when he was younger in the sixties and this single cut tells us a lot about the sixties compared the seventies. In the mise-en-scene, we can see that the sixties is a lot brighter which implies that it was better to live during that time period than the seventies, this is probably due to the lack of hoodlums and drugs at this moment in time. There is also a voice over narration from Rocket, which is done so we get more information about the favella and it's current state from someone who currently lives there and has experience of it during the last 2 decades. Furthermore, in the mise-en-scene, there is a lot more space behind Rocket, especially compared to earlier on in the scene when there was houses stacked upon each other and hardly any room to move in. Contextually, this is because the population of people living in the favellas from the sixties to the seventies increased massively, and as a result they had to build lots more houses to accommodate for these people, when in reality they haven't got much space to really build them houses. The editing in the sixties also tells us that living during the sixties was a lot calmer and more peaceful for the favella citizens, this is because the editing during this scene in the sixties is a lot slower with longer takes, which is a complete juxtaposition compared to the seventies which had quicker cuts and therefore slower takes. Lastly, in the sixties, Rocket doesn't have his camera on him but in the seventies he does. This generates meaning because Rocket's choice of weapon is his camera, as a pose to most others in the favellas which is a gun. The similarities between the 2 are that both of these tools shot, the camera shots pictures whereas the gun shots bullets. Therefore, by Rocket not having the camera in the sixties, this would imply that there isn't much violence in the favellas at this current moment in time, due to Rocket not having his weapon on him in this shot.