Rodrigo Amaro
Industrial espionage, pirate radio run by creative artists, massive news coverage, and some romance in between. "Radio Pirata" makes a strange mess with those elements but if you're attentive enough and knows how to enjoy a simple entertainment with the best of what Brazil had to share during the 1980's with its shock of colorful images and fun music, then you won't have any trouble in following this movie. In it, Bravo (Jayme Periard) and Alice (Lidia Brondi) are falsely accused of murdering Carlos (Ewerton de Castro), colleague of Bravo in a powerful company that has some mysterious scheme involving a spy who's stealing information from them and selling to a rival; and after such discovery strange things start to happen. Now, Alice and her artist friends who run a pirate radio will expose the truth behind Carlos' murder and try to find clues on who's behind the tragedy and who's the person infiltrated in the company. The radio experience proves to be a successful one, and the media, represented by the reporter played by Maria Zilda Bethlem, is all desperate to get more information on this affair, later turned into Brazil's biggest corporation scandal. And while the serious things follows its normal course, Alice and Bravo spend some lovely moments together. Enjoyable in almost all accounts, "Radio Pirata" faces a problem with its confusing character presentation, something that never rings true or with any plausibility - Bravo and Alice first meeting in amazingly awkward. Somehow from the act of the guy accidentally hitting the girl and dropping her food, and later trying to buy her some dinner, that fails cause the restaurants are all closed, so he takes her home, next thing you know they're in love with each other. One small example of how strange this are. With humor, involving characters (Ewerton stole the show as the anxious friend who knew too much; and the troupe of artists are priceless) and a bunch of fun sequences, the movie delivers a good escapism that also allows itself to present some serious topics, though only scratching the surface but still worthy of notice. Above all, it's the charm of that fun decade that makes this a far more enjoyable entertainment than it is. 7/10
