And while opening ceremony director Fernando Meirelles shines a spotlight on the best of Brazil during the three-hour presentation, he also doesn't shy away from describing the country's social problems either.
According to guests, during a section on the urbanisation of Brazil, spectators will hear a song describing Brazil's high number of road accident victims.
Then, as Gisele, the world's highest paid supermodel and one of Brazil's most famous stars, struts down a catwalk to the sound of The Girl From Ipanema, she is held up by an actor and robbed, according to internet posts.
Images of the Opening Ceremony dress rehearsal were posted on Facebook and Snapchat.
A chase then takes place around the 78,000-seater stadium as police officers race to catch the assailant before she shows that good will prevail, according to reports.
During the show, music, dance and 3D projections will trace the history of Brazil, its music, conquests and contribution to the world, using a cast of 300 professional dancers and 5,000 volunteers. It will include a flyover of a replica 14 Bis, the first biplane built by Brazilian aviation pioneer Santos Dumont.
Those who have seen the show - many of whom posted enthusiastically on Instagram - have revealed that it starts with a call for peace, before moving through Brazil's jungles with the indigenous tribes to its cities and the colonisers - ending up in its slums for the main part of the ceremony.
Images of the Opening Ceremony dress rehearsal were posted on Facebook and Snapchat.
But it will not be a 'chronological' piece, telling the tale of the arrival of Brazil's many different inhabitants over the years, director Leonardo Caetano insisted.
"It will be a reinterpretation of Brazil," he told the BBC. "We will have a moment in which we will show... the Brazilian way of receiving people. The second is the 'Garden'. Brazil live on the largest green reserve in the world and this is an important issue for us.
Images of the Opening Ceremony dress rehearsal were posted on Facebook and Snapchat.
The third is about creativity, the Brazilians' ability to do more with less.'
The latter part is important for Caetano to stress - Rio's Opening Ceremony does not have anywhere near the budget of London 2012.
However, the spectacle - five years in the planning - is not short on ambition. Some 400,000 hours have been put in already, with volunteers and professionals alike wearing 12,000 different costumes which used an impressive 22 miles of tissue, according to the BBC.
On the night, the ceremony will use 2,000 light guns, 3,000 kilos of fireworks and 109 projectors to create its magic - not to mention the 12,000 athletes who will march into the stadium behind their own little samba bands, waving their countries' flags.
They will also be performing an important role, planting a sapling in a totem which will grow to become a forest of 12,000 trees in Deodoro Olympic Park, according to Globo.
The spectacle will also feature British actress Judi Dench, who will read a poem alongside Brazilian film and TV star Fernanda Montenegro. It is thought the theme will revolve around global problems.
Spoiler alert. The opening ceremony closes with fireworks.
