Own Goal? (Goal! (DVD))

Member Name: thedevilinme

Product:	Goal! (DVD)
Date:	01/02/09 (172 review reads)
Rating:

Advantages: For what it is its OK

Disadvantages: Tough to make a sports movie

It's tough to make a decent British sports film, let alone a football one. Some of us have yet to recover from Sean Bean in the atrocious 'When Saturday Comes', a foolish vanity project around his beloved Sheffield United. I like Bean but that was more like Mr Bean! The only other one I can think of, apart from the 'Arsenal Stadium Mystery' from the black & white flat cap days, was that equally ridiculous effort to Beans movie with Ian McShane from the 1970s. A quick Imdb.com search reveals it to be 'Yesterdays Heroes'. But the premier league has made British football the best in the world once again and so it's inevitable someone would cash in on that and take the dip with another film, and what better team to build the drama around than the saga that is Newcastle United.

The 'Toon', of course, has the games most passionate and demanding fans; some way say idiots in the way that they are always piling unrealistic pressure on team managers and so getting them fired, even the great Bobby Robson bought down by this collective hubris. At least in the movies they may get to win their first trophy for 52 years (the Intertoto Cup doesn't count), Goal the first film in a trilogy that should deliver Newcastle some silverware. Sadly the first film is nowhere near as shiny and exciting as the Newcastle dream and one suspects the recent released sequel, Goal 2:' Keeping the Dream Alive', is little better.
Director Danny Cannon took no risks here and went for the straightforward rags to riches story that Sean Bean lived and sadly died on, the tweak here being it's a young foreign apprentice player trying to make it in the premiership, both the film and Mexican centre-forward facing a predictable relegation campaign if they didn't hit the ground running in the freezing cold of Northern England.

-The Cast-

Kuno Becker ... Santiago Munez
Tony Plana ... Hernan Munez
Miriam Colon ... Mercedes
Alessandro Nivola ... Gavin Harris
Jorge Cervera ... Cesar
Alfredo Rodríguez ... Julio
Kate Tomlinson ... Val
Leonardo Guerra ... 10-Year-Old Santiago
Jake Johnson ... Tom
Zachary Johnson ... Rory
Stephen Dillane ... Glen Foy
Sean Pertwee ... Barry Rankin
Jonathan Hernandez ... Armando

-The Plot-

The story kicks off in Mexico, where little Santiago (Leonardo Guerra) is growing up in the poorest barrios of Mexico City but already showing dazzling football skills. When he and his family illegally cross the border into the US his dream to play soccer and be famous has a bigger chance of succeeding. We then flash forward another decade and Santiago (Kuno Becker) is a fully grown teenager, spotted by Newcastle United scout Glen ( Stephen Dillane) playing for a local Los Angeles team, but only invited to a trial if he can get himself to the North East of England by January on his own steam and money he has never had.

Proud dad Hernan (Tony Plana), in solid sports movie tradition, is naturally against his boy's dreams of a greater life elsewhere, no money to pay for the flight forthcoming because he doesn't have it and disowning his boy if he goes against his will. Santiago also risks exposing his family's illegal status in America if he leaves for England. So enter mom Mercedes (Miriam Colon), determined to make her boy happy, and just so happens to have $2000 dollars in the biscuit tin.

It's cold and wet by the Tyne, Santiago's first trail a real disaster, Newcastle's Romanian manager (Marcel Lures) not impressed. It's a more physical game here and Santiago's secret health deficiency isn't helping his chances. But Scout Glen is determined the kid is the real deal and persuades the manager to give him another chance, which means he has to take it this time or home in shame, Newcastle cocky star striker Gavin Harris (Alessandro Nivola) taking the kids under his wing to see if he can live that dream.

-Imdb.com Trivia-

Amongst the many big name celebrity cameos here, including Beckham, Raul and Zidane, Brian Johnson of AC/DC has an appearance in the film as a Geordie fan. Before AC/DC, he sang in the band 'Geordie'

-The Conclusion-

Although this is a visually well made piece with neatly interpolated real Premiership action and players like Alan Shearer to give it some realism that the kid really is out on the pitch with them the story, alas, is expectantly derivative and cliché, like all sports movies generally are. Yes this formulae works when done well, as we have seen with films like Rocky and Chariots of Fire, but the truth is we see that real rags to riches story played out everyday in the real premiership here so where's the film? Fair play to director Danny Cannon of C.S.I. fame for giving it ago and respect for getting the big cameo names like Beckham and Raul on board to boost the grosses, perhaps a pointer to the film being aimed more at US audiences than a British one, but like a football song bought out for a team going to Wembley or the World Cup, the football motion picture is rarely New Orders, World in Motion, almost always the 'Fog on the Tyne' by Gazza.

There is a decent Brit Pop soundtrack and the match scenes are reasonably authentic, but such is the nature of that splicing in one scene Munez is about to take a corner with a white ball wearing the number 22 shirt and then when he kicks the balls he's wearing 23 and crossing a yellow ball. I think it's fair to say the continuity on 'Goal' is somewhat lazy. It pretty predictable story wise and clearly written to generate sequel after sequel, although the follow up to this called 'Goal 2', that sees Newcastle United in Europe, is indeed an example of how film can take us into that fantasy land the reality never can. Will Goal 3 be about the returning hero Munez doing a Keegan and getting them out of the Championship with his goals we wonder? All you can really say about this movie is that it will work much better to a foreign audience as it will to a British one; the sub-titles giving it a little more arty appeal in somewhere like Argentina.

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Imdb.com scores it 6.9 out of 10.0 (12,323 votes)
RuN-TiMe 118 minutes
3 for £6 weekly deal at Blockbusters
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Summary: Newcastle United in the Champions League?