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The Boca do Lixo (‘Mouth of Garbage’) is first and foremost a physical place in the center of São Paulo, covering a few blocks of the Santa Ifigênia neighborhood behind the city’s main railway terminal. The prevalence of banditry and prostitution in the area earned it its namesake in the film world (by the late 1980s, the area was better known as ‘Crackland’). Unglamorous in the absolute, the Boca was a place for young producers to set up shop on little to no budget. The working-class ethos of the neighborhood provided a production infrastructurEdición / Editing: construction materials for sets, props, food, costumes, etc., were all furnished cheaply and locally. A restaurant owner could cater for a film shoot with the promise of earning back-end profits. Its proximity to central railway lines also brought added convenience for shipping films to cinemas all over Brazil. In the early 1950s, distributors and small production outfits had already installed themselves on the Boca’s main arterial pathway: Triunfo Street. By the end of the next decade, Triunfo Street was a hangout for aspiring filmmakers, starlets, journalists, students, and many others. Studio exiles and young intellectuals congregated in the Boca; its peculiarity as a quick-and-dirty production center meant producers were more likely to take risks on unconventional material. By 1973, the Boca do Lixo had entered its golden era.