Words by Rosalind Thacker
We take a look at Netflix’s newest sports documentary, Pelé, and its portrayal of the politics behind the player.
There will forever be a debate between football fans as to who is the best player of all time, and Pelé certainly comes to mind as one of the greatest. Winning three World Cups, scoring over 1,000 goals and being the youngest player ever to do both, it would be safe to say he was at the pinnacle of his footballing era.
As the preeminent football star of his generation, Pelé’s rise to fame began at a pivotal moment in his country’s history. Brazil was enduring a military coup and a repressive dictatorship as the country was trying to define itself as a superpower. Pelé was also playing during an era when football was coming of age on television, meaning, at the ripe age of 17, he was able to capture global audiences with his infamous and affable persona. As a result, Netflix’s newest sports documentary delves into an examination of Pelé’s influence, or rather lack thereof, in condemning the military coup. Pelé’s stance was entirely non-political, as he was more than aware that his own image, life and career was of paramount importance when it came to representing the image of his country abroad. While the documentary treats Pelé’s apolitical stance as an understandable response to a very real threat, the talking heads featured in the documentary say differently – at one point, he is negatively compared to Muhammad Ali. Yet, the difference was Muhammed Ali faced imprisonment if he refused the draft to Vietnam – Pelé faced state-sanctioned murder.
The documentary begins with an 80-year-old Pelé walking feebly into the interview room on a Zimmer frame, and gives a brief introduction of the Brazilian’s humble, working-class upbringing. It then jumps quite quickly into his explosive debut with the Brazilian national team in the 1958 World Cup where, to quote the documentary, “he became a symbol of Brazil’s emancipation.” Pelé very much radiated boy-next-door qualities, and as, arguably, the world’s first Black sporting superstar, he managed to set the standard for footballing achievement for decades to follow. Throughout the documentary, Pelé very much remains the narrator of his own narrative. He drops his guard at times as he faces some difficult questioning, appearing emotional as he recounts some sensitive memories.
Overall, Pelé (the documentary, that is) is incredibly moving and took a turn into the wider topic of the political use of sport that personally, I wasn’t expecting it to take. Whether you’re watching it for the timeless archive footage of Pelé playing in his prime or the eye-opening tensions that preceded his career, for a film nearing on two-hours it certainly manages to cover a lot of ground. If you’re like myself, someone who is generally familiar with Pelé’s name, I’d say it provides just the right amount of detail. However, if you’re looking for an answer as to who is really the greatest footballer of all time, I’d say you will walk away from the documentary feeling frustrated more than anything. But then again, that isn’t what it was made for.
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