Patagonia Football Club

Alba (54) is the coach and founder of Patagonia Football Club, an under-17 women’s soccer team at a modest country club. The team has been struggling: it hasn’t won a regional championship in three years. Alba herself has not been feeling well either. Although she is a maternal figure to her players, especially Ovelha (17), she feels like a terrible mother to her son Leonardo (20). Determined to prioritize her personal life over football, Alba invites Ângela (25) to become her assistant coach and eventual replacement. That same night, Leonardo announces that he will soon move to São Paulo for work. Alba finds herself torn between embracing change and holding on to her old tactics. Tensions rise as the regional championship approaches. Alba chooses to embrace the new, and Ângela’s changes help the team improve. Alba is finally able to say goodbye to her son. A year goes by. Alba, now working alongside Ângela, continues coaching a new team. And she also continues being Leonardo’s mother.

Director’s Statement

To a young person, the figure of a mentor is a mystery: someone present in everyday life, capable of transforming a life without ever realizing it. A good mentor is also flawed, shaped by insecurities that reveal themselves only in small details. A mentor can be a teacher, a coach, a mother. Alba, the protagonist of Patagonia Football Club, is all of these things — and she is going through a crisis.

As the coach of a women’s football team, she decides to gradually step away in order to reconnect with her son. But he chooses to leave, further destabilizing her place in the world. The film follows this intimate displacement of a woman who, accustomed to guiding others, must relearn how to deal with her own losses.

Set in the Grajaú neighborhood, the narrative incorporates the rhythm and soundscape of the area, where an apparently calm daily life coexists with silent tensions. Divided into four chapters — Defense, Midfield, Attack, and Goal — the film structures Alba’s journey as a constant change of position, both on and off the field.

In this film, I continue my collaboration with Andrea Beltrão, who will bring Alba to life alongside a cast of first-time actresses. In this project, my third feature film and my first solo work, I return to recurring themes in my films: female characters in displacement, forced to reinvent their roles in the face of profound personal ruptures.