Reviews of soccer movies and football films
Documentaries about football, Fußball, and soccer
When anti-poachers asked a village how to help, the answer was a football league.
As a child, Matt Bracken developed a love for Africa’s wildlife, which lead to his becoming a safari travel specialist. From there, he became an anti-poaching ranger for ProTrack in South Africa. Protrack has 300 rangers in Mozambique who fight rhinoceros poachers.
Continue reading “The Rhino Cup (2019) – can football reduce poaching?”
As a soccer fan who rarely watches any other sport these days, I tend to forget that basketball, baseball and pointy football don’t have fans like soccer football does. Following the European and Latin American traditions, soccer is the only pro sport in the USA where, pre-pandemic, supporters groups show up with songs, drums, banners, flags, TIFOs and a s**tload of enthusiasm.
Continue reading “‘Muerte o Gloria: The Rise of the American Soccer Fan’ (2015)”
Football clubs used to publish just a single documentary film about themselves every so often, but now they’ve migrated to massive streaming series. Usually I avoid football club and player movies because I know they are going to amount to a very long marketing video. I made an exception for the Netflix series Sunderland ’Til I Die. And here’s why.
Continue reading “Sunderland ’Til I Die (2018) takes your eye off the truth”
13 Lost is a documentary about the unsung diving team that defied life-threatening conditions to lay the line to rescue the Wild Boars soccer team. This gripping film shows the bravery and calmness of these men under duress, and the technical expertise that kept them alive.
Continue reading “’13 Lost: The Untold Story of the Thai Cave Rescue’ (2020)”
What foments political change? What makes a people realize they deserve a say in how their lives are run? This documentary convinces us the answer is combining politics with football and rock ’n roll.
Continue reading “‘Democracia em Preto e Branco’ (2014) politics football and rock ‘n roll”
In this charming documentary, community organizer and radio show presenter Beka Ntsanwisi explains how and why she started Vakhegula Vakhegula, a soccer club for grannies in the region of Limpopo, South Africa. Suffering from chronic diseases or traumas, these Vakhegula (grannies, also called gogos) found football made them healthier and lifted their focus away from pain.
Continue reading “‘Alive & Kicking: The Soccer Grannies of South Africa’ (2016)”
Soccertown USA is a treasure of painstaking research conducted by Writers Tom McCabe and Kirk Rudell. For years, I had wondered why so many US National Team players and referees came from New Jersey. This documentary explains how the Town of Kearny, a suburb of Newark, NJ, was a working class neighborhood of immigrants who brought their love of the game to their new country. The town became an oasis of excellence that developed American champions.
Continue reading “‘Soccertown USA’ (2018) the Jersey Boys of soccer”
In France, Footeuses is what female footballers call themselves, the feminine form of Footballeur. Until recently, to be a female footballer was largely an oxymoron: to be female and a football player was not accepted. This changed with the Womens World Cup 2019 in France and the hope that the hosting country’s women would repeat the French mens’ success at WC 2018.
Continue reading “‘Footeuses’ (2020) add women and football to your lexicon”
Streetball is not just another homeless world cup film, it is the best of its genre. Despite being 10 years old, this documentary is fresh, vibrant, and still relevant in its reflection of the world today. Streetball also stands out as one of the few homeless world cup (HWC) films where the soccer is as engaging as the stories of the people.
Continue reading “‘Streetball’ (2010) best Homeless World Cup soccer movie”
I almost passed up watching The 99ers on my ESPN+ subscription, because I thought I had already ‘seen it all’ about the 1999 USWNT. But what a mistake if you miss watching this episode of the espnW Nine for IX series. IX in this case refers to Title IX, which required that colleges provide equal funding for womens and mens sports.
Continue reading “‘The 99ers’ (2013) a unique insider view of 1999 USWNT”
It’s hard to believe that Brett Ratner, director of the Rush Hour franchise, put together the worst ESPN 30 for 30 segment that I have seen. Mysteries of the Jules Rimet Trophy covers all the facts, but the production is flat, and the importance of the artifact is blown way out of proportion. It’s almost facetious. It’s not the Holy Grail, it’s a small piece of metal of a woman holding up a cup. It’s not even gold.
Continue reading “ESPN falls flat with ‘Mysteries of the Jules Rimet Trophy’ (2014)”Barbosa, the Man Who Made Brazil Cry revisits the trauma bestowed upon goalkeeper Barbosa, who is often blamed for Brazil’s loss to Uruguay in the Final of World Cup 1950 at the Maracana stadium. This match is famously known as the disastrous El Maracanazo.
Continue reading “Review: ‘Barbosa, the Man Who Made Brazil Cry’ (2014)”The Myth of Garrincha is a 22 minute episode in ESPN’s 30 for 30 Soccer Stories, currently available on ESPN+. Garrincha was Pelé’s peer, and as long as they were on the field together, Brazil never lost a World Cup.
Continue reading “ESPN explores ‘The Myth of Garrincha’ (2014)”
Last month, I reviewed Zebras, a low-budget documentary which followed the Argentine boys team that competed in the 2014 Street Kids World Cup in Brazil. StreetKids United 2: The Girls of Rio is a slicker production by Director Maria Clara, following a team of girls from Rio who compete in the same tournament,
Continue reading “‘StreetKids United 2: The Girls of Rio’ (2015) raises awareness”
You might expect that as a reviewer of soccer movies, I would be well aware of COPA90, a company that claims to be “The world’s largest independent football media business”, delivering stories on “football like you’ve never seen it before”. I knew the name, but I hadn’t looked at their content until I watched Derby Days Berlin, an episode of their Copa90 Stories youtube channel.
Continue reading “Derby Days Berlin (2019) will make you a fan”