Category: Drama
-
‘Maradona: the hand of God’ (2007) in under 2 hours
Right now, Amazon is showing Season 1 of Maradona Sueno Bendito, a 10-episode compilation of “sex, drugs, and historic goals”. While waiting for that serie’s episodes to appear, I supplemented my viewing with this similarly-themed feature film, which was produced in Italy and released in 2007.
-
‘The International Player’ (2009) entertaining Egyptian drama
The International Player kicks off with a somewhat familiar scene — a celebrity leaves a night club accompanied by 2 women who are ready to party. The man drives fast and recklessly, until he crashes his Porsche convertible into a concrete wall. From his hospital bed, the film looks backward to see how the player…
-
‘Cool Kids Don’t Cry’ (2012) is a better Eighth Grade
Cool Kids Don’t Cry is a hopeful and touching film about a vibrant eighth grade girl who contracts leukemia, and how she and her classmates respond to her illness as it progresses.
-
‘Soccer Mom Madam’ (2021) is not a soccer movie
First of all, let’s set the record straight. Soccer Mom Madam is not a soccer movie. But its provocative title is going to occupy any search for the keywords “soccer mom movie”, so I am posting this review as a public service to soccer fans. 🙂
-
‘Champion’ (2019) – the 2nd best Indian soccer drama
Released just 2 months after Bigil, one might write off Champion as a literal poor man’s version of that big budget production. Champion‘s star (Vishwa K as Jones) is an unknown newcomer, there are no dance scenes or music videos, and there is no CGI. Both films relate to criminal life in the slums, but…
-
‘Baggio: The Divine Ponytail’ (2021) – GOAT or goat?
When creating a biopic about a footballer, who you claim to be one of the best that ever played, the rule is that the film must have some football in it. At least have enough soccer to show the viewer that the player’s greatness cannot be denied.
-
‘A Barefoot Dream’ (2010) a Korean in East Timor
In the drama A Barefoot Dream, Kim Won-kang is a former youth national team footballer for South Korea. In adulthood, he has never succeeded in anything, losing his own money and that of family and friends. He heads to the newly independent country of Timor-Leste (East Timor) to get rich quick and redeem his reputation,…
-
‘Sikandar’ (2009) and terrorism in Kashmir
Sikandar opens with the activities of a small Muslim village in a beautiful mountainous setting. As school lets out, children stream downhill to the market plaza. A child spies a loose soccer ball, kicks it, and it explodes, blowing apart everything and everyone in the plaza. Welcome to routine life in Kashmir.
-
I’m no fan of ‘Fan of Amoory’ (2018)
The most charitable description of Fan of Amoory is that it is well-meaning propaganda meant to exhort young boys to follow their dreams and work to achieve them in the glory of the UAE.
-
‘Penalty’ (2019) a well-meaning film that stereotypes
Penalty is a well-meaning but mostly flaccid first feature film from Director Shubham Singh. Singh uses football as a vehicle to weave a narrative about discrimination in northern India.
-
‘Adidas vs Puma’ (2016) – How the feud began
Duell der Brüder is a welcome entry in my list of football films. Titled Adidas vs Puma for Amazon, it covers a small but significant piece of sports history along with the drama of two brothers turned personal and business enemies amid the effects of World War 2.
-
Football frames ’90 Minutos’ (2020) of life in Honduras
90 Minutos is an excellent first feature from Pulsar, a young Honduran filmmaking company. Director Aeden O’Connor Agurcia and Writer Daniel Frañó fused 4 disparate stories from Honduran life, each with a connection to football. But soccer is mainly a vehicle to capture movie-goers’ attention in a futbol-crazy country.
-
‘The Goal’ is social justice + football in 1999
Gulbahar Singh is a director who wants to make feature films on humanity, and The Goal (द गोल) is an unusual football drama in that its coach decides that overcoming prejudice is more important than winning.
-
Daisy Shah a reason to watch ‘Gujarat 11’ (2019)
Gujarat 11 is promoted as the first Gujarati sports film and stars popular and handsome Gujarati actors Daisy Shah and Pratik Gandhi. The story mixes in a number of themes, but while each theme has good points, they are not enough to forgive 2 hours and 20 minutes of banality.
-
‘Cold Sweat’ (2018) – wife banned from travelling
Many have compared Cold Sweat with the 2006 feature Offside, which is perhaps the most famous soccer movie out of Iran. But to do so is a crime, even though both dramas are about women trying to exercise simple human rights that are denied to them in Iran.
-
Review: ‘The Naked Man on the Sports Field’ (1974)
Der nackte Mann auf dem Sportplatz is not really a soccer movie. This 1974 film from the East German director Konrad Wolf is about a sculptor (Kurt Böwe) in a small town, who gets a commission to create a monument for the local football stadium. Since the artist is fairly well known, the local authorities…
-
‘The Keeper’ (2018) – when good play heals divides
The Keeper is based on the young life of ManCity goalkeeper Bert Trautmann, whose worldwide fame is due to having weathered the last 20 minutes of the 1956 FA Cup Final with a broken neck. But fittingly, that incident is a smaller part of the movie, because the real story is how a Nazi soldier…
-
Just say No to ’The Wrong Student’ (2017)
The actress Vivica A. Fox has had 2 key roles that convey strength or a killer instinct (Independence Day and Kill Bill). She has leveraged these traits to produce a series of 14 “Wrong” movies for Lifetime TV, of which The Wrong Student is the 2nd film.
-
‘Meninos de Kichute’ (2010) an engaging look back at Brazilian life
I watched Meninos de Kichute on TubiTV and was surprised to find such a well-crafted film that I had never heard of. Set in 1975, the story shows life in a small Brazilian city, where for men a status car is a Dodge Dart or a Karmann Ghia, and for boys, it is a pair of…
-
‘Captain’ (2018) is not worth your time
Jayasurya plays V.P. Sathyan, Captain of the Indian National Team in the 1980s, who committed suicide in 2006 at age 41. First-time Writer-Director Prajesh Sen tells the story of Sathyan’s career, which should have been more recognized and rewarded.
