12 must-watch soccer movies that capture the spirit of the game
Bend it like Beckham plays on the superstardom of English football star David Beckham.
Image: X
Soccer the beautiful game. But like any endeavor, it can encompass the good, the bad, and the ugly. Or at least movies about soccer can, engaging with themes of race and gender, ego, hubris, economics, politics, fandom, the thrill of victory and the agony of defeat - as well as, of course, unadulterated athleticism. If the game has captured your imagination and you want continued programming when World Cup games aren’t on, it might be time to turn to cinema. Here are 12 soccer movies worth revisiting for the laughs, life lessons and fancy footwork they contain.
‘Bend It Like Beckham’
Parminder Nagra shines as Jess, an 18-year-old London soccer whiz who bristles under the social restrictions of her conservative Sikh immigrant parents in this 2002 BAFTA-nominated charmer. With its infectious soundtrack, ranging from early-aughts Brit-pop to Bhangra, it’s a buoyant sports rom-com: Jess and her soccer teammate (Keira Knightley) both like their coach (a dreamy Jonathan Rhys Meyers). But the story manages to work in threads of sexism, racism and cultural assimilation, as well, without ever losing its deft yet naturalistic control of the narrative ball. PG-13. 112 minutes.
Where to watch: Disney+
‘Early Man’
Underdog sports comedies are a dime a dozen. But this one - culminating in a soccer faceoff between a clan of inept Stone Age players and their more evolved Bronze Age opponents - has the advantage of coming from Aardman, the visually distinctive claymation studio behind the Wallace and Gromit films. It’s cliché in an unconventional package. Soccer, in this 2018 telling, was invented when a small chunk of meteorite fell to Earth during the Neo-Pleistocene Epoch. The climactic match is filled with Aardman’s signature sight gags and cheeky wordplay. Of the Stone Age team’s come-from-behind surge, the game’s colour commentator humorously remarks, “It’s early man … united.” PG. 89 minutes.
Where to watch: Prime Video
‘The Damned United’
The soccer action is characterized by mostly muddy, rain-soaked gameplay in this fact-based, Yorkshire-set 2019 drama, inspired by the tumultuous 44-day tenure of Brian Clough (Michael Sheen) as the manager of the Leeds United team in 1974. Adapted from David Peace’s 2006 book about the heated rivalry between Clough, a brash hotshot, and longtime Leeds manager Don Revie (Colm Meaney), the tale this film tells is ultimately a bromance about Clough and his more staid assistant (Timothy Spall), each of whom realizes he’s nothing without the other. R. 98 minutes.
Where to watch: Apple TV, Google Play, Prime Video, YouTube
The documentary about Diego Maradona gives a warts and all examination of the Argentinian soccer great.
Image: Filippo Monteforte
‘Diego Maradona’
Filmmaker Asif Kapadia brings the same thorough approach used in his Oscar-winning 2016 portrait of singer Amy Winehouse to this exhaustive and fascinating 2019 documentary on the life and career of the late Argentine soccer superstar, who over seven seasons playing for Napoli turned the team into an Italian powerhouse. Still widely assessed as one of the game’s most inventive players, Maradona was short (5-foot-5) and couldn’t jump, but his most important muscle was his brain, according a sportscaster quoted in the film. It’s a warts-and-all look into Maradona’s cocaine use, his involvement with the criminal Neapolitan underworld and his refusal to acknowledge paternity of a son for 30 years. TV-14. 130 minutes.
Where to watch: HBO Max
‘Kicking and Screaming’
This solidly middle-of-the-road family film, revolving around an inept coach (Will Ferrell) who somehow manages to whip a team of preadolescent soccer misfits into shape, is brightened by the actor’s demented genius - Ferrell’s ability, just when you least expect it, to generate flashes of sudden, almost dangerously incandescent humor. Is it Ferrell’s best film? No. But is it laugh-out-loud funny enough to stream with your soccer-loving kids? For sure. PG. 95 minutes.
Where to watch: Apple TV, Google Play, Prime Video, YouTube.
‘Ladybugs’
Panned on theatrical release - and still boasting only a 14 percent rating on Rotten Tomatoes, this 1992 underdog sports comedy stars Rodney Dangerfield as Chester, a salesman who reluctantly accepts a job coaching his company’s all-girls youth league soccer team to gain a promotion. Unfortunately, the players have no skills, and neither does Chester. Salvation arrives in the form of his fiancé’s soccer-obsessed teenage son (Matthew Brandis), who dresses up as a girl to compete as the team’s star player. The Los Angeles Times called it “weirdly distasteful at times,” but it has nevertheless gone on to become a cult classic, fueled by the cultural juggernaut of millennial nostalgia. PG-13. 90 minutes.
Where to watch: Apple TV, Google Play, Prime Video, YouTube.
‘LFG’
Acclaimed husband-and-wife documentarians Sean Fine and Andrea Nix Fine, who won an Oscar for their short film “Inocente,” chart the saga of the U.S. women’s national soccer team - who sued the U.S. Soccer Federation for equal pay in 2019. The title of this 2021 film is an abbreviated version of the team’s rallying cry of “Let’s f------ go,” and it aptly captures the players’ righteous anger, along with the same determination that led them to four World Cup titles, including one just months after the lawsuit was filed. TV-MA. 105 minutes.
Where to watch: HBO Max
Former Manchester United forward Eric Cantona is the subject of the film ‘Looking for Eric’.
Image: AP
‘Looking for Eric’
The sports action in this 2009 fantasy soccer dramedy by Ken Loach, the British master of working-class social realism, is all archival: clips of the legendary French forward Eric Cantona playing for Manchester United. But the now-retired player, who executive produced the film, also appears in an acting role as himself, playing “Eric Cantona,” the imaginary life coach of a sad-sack English postman and soccer fan undergoing a midlife crisis (Steve Evets). It’s a perfect - and perfectly self-parodying - role for Cantona, who during his career with Man U was known for his cryptic, Zen-like musings during postgame news conferences. Not rated. 116 minutes.
Where to watch: AMC Plus via Prime Video
‘Next Goal Wins’
Taika Waititi (“Jojo Rabbit”) directs this sweet and inspiring true story, inspired by a 2014 documentary, about the American Samoan national soccer team and its 31-0 loss to Australia in a 2001 World Cup qualifying match - the worst defeat in the history of international soccer. Michael Fassbender plays the coach of a team that includes the first openly nonbinary and transgender athlete to compete in a FIFA World Cup qualifier. It’s a film about soccer whose winning message is there’s more to life than soccer. PG-13. 104 minutes.
Where to watch: Apple TV, Google Play, Prime Video, YouTube
‘Offside’
Controversial Iranian filmmaker Jafar Panahi, whose conviction for propaganda against the state was recently upheld, had to submit a fake screenplay to get permission to make this comedy about teen girls who disguise themselves as boys to circumvent the official prohibition - now loosened - against girls attending soccer games. Shot, guerrilla style, during an actual 2005 World Cup match between Iran and Bahrain, the film takes place mostly in an Azadi Stadium holding pen where six scofflaws have been corralled. The soccer action is all offscreen, but the exhilaration, captured by ad hoc color commentary from one of the young guards, is thrillingly palpable. PG. 93 minutes.
Where to watch: Apple TV, Google Play, Prime Video, YouTube
‘Shaolin Soccer’
The most eye-popping cinematic soccer action you’re likely to ever see is in this 2001 delirious kung fu sports comedy, written, directed, produced and edited by popular Hong Kong comedian Stephen Chow. With over-the-top wire stunt work, slo-mo, fast-mo, stereoscopic freeze, a dance number and sight gags riffing on everything from “Jurassic Park” to “Saving Private Ryan,” the film centers on six martial arts whizzes who bring their skills to the soccer pitch. It’s “Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon” with cleats. PG-13. 87 minutes.
Where to watch: Paramount Plus
‘Soccertown USA’
This 2019 documentary focuses on a small industrial suburb of New York that some have called the cradle of American soccer: Kearny, New Jersey, where three players and childhood friends - John Harkes, Tony Meola and Tab Ramos - honed their skills on local streets and fields, ultimately competing together in the 1990 and 1994 World Cup tournaments for the U.S. men’s team. It’s not just a tale of athletes punching above their weight. It’s a portrait of a sport with gritty immigrant and working-class roots that has exploded in popularity in the intervening years. Unrated. 67 minutes.
Where to watch: YouTube
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