Chico Bento e a Goiabeira Maraviosa

Adapting comic books is quite a challenge, especially for an iconic character like Chico Bento, present in the childhood of millions of Brazilians. Those responsible knew this and took extra care, preferring to be faithful to the work rather than risk doing something "modern", at the pace of today's world: it is in simplicity that depth is found. Chico Bento is a defender of nature and its roots in confronting such savage progress, but he doesn't know how to act. Together with his classmates at Vila Abobrinha, he learns, by force, what his role is. Director Fernando Fraiha has the delicacy to talk about important topics lightly, with good humor, without didacticism or moral lessons. The round script creates an interesting and inventive arc. The animated scenes are one of the best I've seen in Brazilian cinema, they alone are worth going to the cinema, and all the secondary characters are authentic, well constructed, not just the main one. I confess that in some scenes I didn't understand the caipirês, yet another reason to watch it again and appreciate the film better. Critics have been generous, with lots of praise, let's see if the general public will enjoy it. It's not often that, in this world full of violence and disagreements, we can go back to childhood, be naive for an hour and a half.

The third live action film of characters from Maurício de Souza has good educational and environmental elements for kids and may also amuse them. The script has nice dialogue moments and thenorigin story for the guava tree was nice. The most remarkable perhaps is how much Isaac Amendoim is a skilled child actor, quite impressive. Anyway, something that happened in the two previous movies (Mônica's gang: Bonds, and Mônica's gang: Lessons) and that bored me was the lack of compromise in portraying the characters the most similar to the cartoon possible. It repeated here (not in the same level of Cascão in the other two movies; Isaac Amendoim would have been a better cast, by the way), but Zé Lelé's actor is not very similar (although the clothes and hairstyle reduce the problem a little), and Chico Bento, besides using shoes (why?! He is always barefoot in the cartoon!), looks completely different in the movie (although, as I said, the actor's performance was excellent). Adult characters were also nice, particularly Nhô Lau and Colonel Agripino. To resume, the film is cute enough, with a praiseworthy social engagement (what does not happen often in Maurício de Souza's projects, by the way), and has good performances, but is tepid sometimes and not as true to original source as I would like.

The sweetest child's movie I've seen in recent years. It's particularly special to me due to my childhood experience with the universe of Mauricio de Souza and his comic books. For Brazilians, guava also tastes like childhood, and I suspect that's what makes this movie so delightful: The kid that plays the main character is a child star with an amazing performance for his age. The creative solutions for producing a live action from a comic strip universe presented in the movie have a breath of innovation and innocence that lightens the heart. Great job with maintaining the original references from the books, and use of cartoons for the dive in dream works was simply beautiful, well done and of geniality. Great job!

Adapting stories is always a mountain to climb, imagine when that story is one of the greatest comic books in the world and one of the most beloved characters in a country, that thousands of children have connected with because of its adventurous soul and heart open to love and surprise.

The film shows a very beautiful affection and awareness of the importance of the character, I understand what makes him special and with an enviable focus, it focuses on transporting you to your memories with that boy when he was just a drawing on sheets of paper.

This simple understanding of Chico Bento brings a beautiful depth to the film, showing us his almost druid spirit towards nature and his anguish with modernization and the abandonment of life in simplicity.

With his colleagues from Vila Abobrinha, we see Chico grow and understand the world more clearly, treating with kindness the lessons in this adventure and Chico's personality that makes him special in the world of Turma da Mônica and in the hearts of so many children, now adults.

With a wraparound arch. Chico proves to be a children's character capable of being translated to the new generation, reviving his exploratory spirit, with touching animated scenes and a group of well-written secondary characters that don't look out of place alongside the beloved Chico.

In a cynical and blasé world, perhaps Chico is a dose of the medicine we need to remember to take it easy and embrace what's left of our purity during the film.

I admit I cried a little here, the whole rhythm of the story and its characters reminded me so much of my childhood.

I learned how to read with these little stories and seeing the respect with which they were treated fills my heart with joy and pride. Simply beautiful, simply the part where I feel proud of being a country boy and being Brazilian. And this is what this movie is... Simple and pure... The characters made they work perfectly, showing one of the most beautiful parts of our land, they are the simple folk of Brasil, like my grandma, my uncles, my parents, myself... I never feel so represented like this, from the bottom of my heart. Thank you.