Neymar: The Perfect Chaos Review 2022 Tv Show Series Season Cast Crew Online

Root around on Netflix, beyond what the algorithm suggests might be “for you,” and you’ll find a cornucopia of international delicacies: Bollywood musicals, South African soap operas, Japanese yakuza thrillers. Of higher profile but of global interest is “Neymar: The Perfect Chaos,” a three-part biographical documentary about Neymar da Silva Santos Jr., known throughout the world of fútbol as Neymar Jr.—the Brazilian bad boy widely regarded as among the best, perhaps ever, at playing the beautiful game.

A certain 9-year-old soccer fan/player has insisted to me that “The Perfect Chaos” is the greatest sports feature ever made. It’s not. Asif Kapadia’s 2019 “ Diego Maradona, ” just for instance, is superior, and for reasons painfully relevant to the Neymar series. For one thing, the 2019 edition of Maradona himself (who died in 2020) didn’t dominate that film—unlike the Neymar of today, who has plenty to say, and is around a lot; director David Charles Rodrigues treats him, often enough, like the star of his own music video. One does get the sense, too, that the other people interviewed about him aren’t as frank as they might be. “Neymar: The Perfect Chaos” also lacks the advantage of reflection: The Neymar story, with its elements of both victory and self-destruction, is still unfolding and could go any number of ways.

Neymar, now nearing 30 years of age, has been a star since he was 14 and briefly played with Real Madrid. He made his professional debut back home on Santos (Pelé’s old team) at 17; joined the Brazilian national team at 18; and suffered a vicious foul in the 2014 World Cup that resulted in both a fractured vertebra and, with Neymar out, an infamous 7-1 defeat of Brazil by Germany (something Neymar avenged at the 2016 Olympics with a walk-off penalty kick). But for all his dramatic accomplishments, the player’s misbehavior off the field has frequently eclipsed his playing. And probably added to his celebrity. (He has approximately 168 million Instagram followers—not as many as his current Paris Saint-Germain teammate Lionel Messi, but enough to place him in the top 20 world-wide.) In a move worth $263 million—making him the most expensive player ever—he transferred from Barcelona, which he had joined in 2013, to PSG in 2017.

While its subject is quite open about most things, “Neymar” doesn’t really get to the bottom of what soccer fans have long suspected, that Neymar’s dissatisfaction with Barcelona lay in knowing he’d always be in the shadow of the Argentine superstar Messi, and that when a similar situation developed at Paris (with the Frenchman Kylian Mbappé) he then wanted to go back to Barcelona. The series might have mentioned, too, that with the Neymar-Mbappé-Messi triumvirate now at PSG, Neymar is playing some of the better and more generous fútbol of his career. (His assists are as thrilling as his goals.)

But “Neymar” goes where it needs to. Neymar Sr., a businessman and his son’s longtime manager, is revealing about the maintenance of the Neymar brand, now and going forward. The documentary addresses the 2019 rape allegation against Neymar, which was dismissed. It also spends an inordinate length of time in places that begin to feel profoundly unnecessary: His affectionate relationship with his young son is worthwhile, but overdone, although his birthday gift to the boy of a box that looks like it contains a scooter, but is actually filled with schoolbooks, is both appalling and revealing. There’s little else that feels candid, except on the field, which is where most viewers will feel the series spends insufficient time.