I watched this a long time ago so my perception of this film may not be so analytic as I tend to do in other reviews but what I do remember of "Garrincha - Estrela Solitária" was a nice picture, somewhat good but very limited considered how big Garrincha was and is in Brazilian culture.
Here's one of the most distinctive soccer players of all time (played by André Gonçalves) considered one of the greatest of Brazil (and those who saw it during 1958 and 1962's World Cups know how good he was), known as 'The Angel with Bent Legs', with unequaled dribbling skills and moves. But the movie haven't showed us that neither his historical matches in the World Cups. So how come a movie about a soccer player doesn't feature scenes of him playing? Huge mistake! There's a few scenes but they never satisfy our hunger for knowing how brilliant the man was on the field.
Instead, all we have is a detailed view on his troubled private life, his marriage with singer Elza Soares (Taís Araújo), his drinking problems that later caused his death by the age of 49. His legacy wasn't well translated to the screen, only the bad parts were.
What is quite shameful or a little bit trivial is the amount of time spent in showing his sexual life (yeah, I know there was lots of rumors about the size of his intimate parts, and things like that but the film never goes that far in showing such). What we get is a few dramas and lots of sex but almost nothing of his talents on camp. Considering the figure's stature and how symbolic Garrincha was and also considering that this film was adapted from Ruy Castro's book, which I don't even need to read to say it's great because the author is an impeccable and influential person in Brazilian journalism, this film could have been so much better.
Performances are good; the recreating of places and events are okay and adding the fact biographical films are rare to be made, this film gets my approval, I liked it despite letting the most important issue on the side. 6/10
