|
“I've spent muddy days watching young lads beat the hell out of each other. But once in a while, there's one that comes along and lifts your heart.” --Glen Foy in “Goal!”
Like every kid, Santiago Munez has a big dream. But unlike every kid, he's given the rare opportunity to make that dream come true-if he's willing to put his fears aside, travel thousands of miles from home, and hold his own with some of the best in the world. The intense pressure and personal sacrifice prove costly for Santiago on his quest-but will they be enough to keep this gifted, determined young athlete and fledgling hero from his ultimate “Goal”?
When Santiago crossed the border into America at the age of 10, he had two things in his possession: his football and a tattered picture of the World Cup. Working menial jobs while growing up in Los Angeles, Santiago's (Kuno Becker) passion was playing football. Convincing his father that he could be an international football star was another story: “There are two types of people in this world,” declared the elder Munez, “People in big houses, and people like us who cut their lawns and wash their cars.”
But when Brit Glen Foy (Stephen Dillane), an amiable former football player and sometime scout spots Santiago at a local L.A. match, he recognizes a deft, fast and brave footballer-the kind of talent that the glamorous English Premier League Club, Newcastle United, is hungry for.
Now thrust into a foreign land where football is a religion and Newcastle's St. James' Park its cathedral, this young American must prove that he's got the grit and the game to win a contract with one of the most prestigious football clubs in the world. Muddy fields, cold winds and crunching blows from teammates-not to mention personal woes, injuries, and the temptations of life in the fast lane-are just a few of the obstacles Santiago must overcome to triumph in the heady, heart-pounding world of international football.
Directed by Danny Cannon, “Goal!” stars up and coming Latino actor Kuno Becker. Some of the hottest representatives from the world of football also appear in the movie, including David Beckham, Zinedine Zidane, Raul, and Newcastle captain Alan Shearer.
Milkshake Films and Buena Vista Pictures International present “Goal!” directed by Danny Cannon. The screenplay was written by Dick Clement and Ian La Frenais. The film is being produced by Mike Jefferies and Matt Barrelle of Milkshake Films and executive produced by Peter Hargitay. With Co-Producer Danny Stepper and Associate Producer Allen Hopkins.
The film also stars Alessandro Nivola, Stephen Dillane, Anna Friel, Marcel Iures, Sean Pertwee, Lee Ross, Stephen Graham, Kevin Knapman, Cassandra Bell, Kieran O'Brien, Tony Plana and Miriam Colon.
The talented creative team includes cinematographer Michael Barrett, editor Chris Dickens, production designer Laurence Dorman, costume designer Lindsay Pugh and composer Graeme Revell.
About the Production
The cinema has given audiences scores of beloved, inspiring films about sports, from “Rocky” to “Raging Bull” to “Miracle.” Producers Mike Jefferies and Matt Barrelle wondered why Hollywood hadn't yet spawned a great football movie.
“We've seen a myriad of tremendously successful films that use sport as a backdrop-films about baseball, basketball, golf, you name it-and it just seemed incredible to me that the world's biggest sport-and, in fact, the biggest form of content on television today-has never been the subject of a decent movie,” says Jefferies.
It was in 2002, when Jefferies and Barrelle were at the World Cup in Japan, that their idea really began to take shape. Barrelle then spent a year researching the movie industry in general and the intricacies of this film in particular. They also got American Danny Stepper in on the venture.
The project was gathering steam. “It seemed like a no-brainer to us,” explains Jefferies. “If we could make a film that resonated on a dramatic level about this kid's story, and create something really engaging that has appeal beyond a sporting audience, so that it can cross over demographics, territory, gender… we'd have something really exciting,” says Jefferies.
Novices to show business, Jefferies and Barrelle had the opportunity to sit down with an OscarÒ-winning director and pick his brain. As a result of the meeting, Barrelle, Jeffries and Stepper boarded a plane to Paris to meet with officials at the Fédération Internationale de Football Association-better known around the world as FIFA.
“We met with FIFA to gain access,” explains Jefferies. “We wanted to be able to use these football properties, be able to film in stadiums and receive clearances, to be able to mitigate the problems we might have with licenses or image rights. We needed FIFA to hold our hand and help us navigate those channels.”
Cementing the deal with FIFA was critical to securing the involvement of the squads and enhancing the authenticity of the film. “Doing a deal with FIFA was incredibly important to us, and doing deals with the teams and actual players was critical as well,” explains Barrelle. “We wanted to use real teams because the fans really know what's going on, and football fans are obviously the most fanatic fans in the world. You can't cheat them. We didn't want to do that, and hopefully you'll see that on the screen.”
After considering several teams, the filmmakers opted to go with Newcastle United-based in a one-club town where footballers are gigantic stars-as the featured team in the film. “Newcastle appealed to us for many different reasons,” explains Mike Jefferies. “They've got very passionate, devoted fans. It's like a religion up there. They've got a tremendous stadium, and they're known for very attacking football. We also met our creative requirements in that the city's very cinematic.”
The Toon Army- the nickname for supporters of Newcastle United, no matter where their origin, often including people from well outside the UK -“really care if Newcastle wins or loses. The place erupts afterwards, and the town is electric,” says Barrelle.
Furthermore, Newcastle is up north, which made for an even stronger contrast with Santiago's balmy hometown, Los Angeles. “Plus the crowd is just crazy, which was fantastic in terms of footage, and capturing that on film was really important to us,” says Barrelle.
Once they chose Newcastle, the producers had to approach the team and secure its cooperation. The producers traveled to the area to have a look around.
With its grey clouds and rabid fans, the filmmakers decided Newcastle was perfect. The squad was amenable to participating in the film. “They loved the idea of exposing their brand around the world,” says Matt Barrelle. “They understand the commercial aspects of boosting the brand-the more money they have, the more money they can spend on players. The better players they have, the more they win.
“They understood what a Hollywood film could do for Newcastle United,” adds Barrelle. “We made a deal pretty quickly with them.”
Jefferies says establishing trust with Newcastle Chairman Freddy Shepherd was the key to their successful relationship. “They knew we understood that their core activity is playing professional football games. We had to be completely respectful of that and work around it,” he says. Filmmakers refrained from filming the players during training on days before a game. Newcastle's manager had to agree to everything.
“We also had to be very respectful of the boundaries, literally the physical and the logistical ones. We couldn't go over on a match day; we couldn't distract the players. But before and after games they were very accommodating. They really got excited about this, and they see the potential. Newcastle and FIFA put every resource at our disposal,” praises Jefferies.
The ease of the relationship reflected the overall professionalism of the squad. “Newcastle is a good example of very tight team that's run very well,” observes Barrelle. “If things work together on the field, they work together in other aspects as well. We were very fortunate to work with Newcastle.”
With the infrastructure in place, including the full cooperation of Newcastle United and FIFA, the filmmakers sought a director. They found him in 36-year old Brit Danny Cannon, who most recently was executive producer of the hugely popular “CSI” series on American television.
Growing up in Luton, Cannon was enamored with football. “Professional football players impress me enormously,” he explains. “They always have, even when I was a kid. They are brilliant at what they do.”
The producers had the utmost confidence in their choice of a leader to helm this sprawling production. “This is an incredibly artistic film; what Danny is doing creatively has never been done in any sports film. We've seen films about horse racing and golf and everything else, but no one's done a film about the world's biggest game,” says Danny Stepper. “So when we set out to do that, not only was it ambitious, but the way we were actually filming the action was incredibly ambitious. This is a film that only Danny can deliver.”
With a director in place, the filmmakers turned to veteran scribes Dick Clement and Ian La Frenais, the Emmy- and BAFTA-winning team behind the screenplays for such films as “The Commitments” and “Still Crazy” and the HBO television series “Tracey Takes On…”
The duo came aboard relatively late in preproduction. “We met with Mike Jefferies and Danny Cannon,” recalls Clement. “We got the go-ahead to write a draft not long after that.”
La Frenais is originally from Newcastle, and both writers live in L.A., so they were well educated about their subject.
“We understand the city where it's set,” says La Frenais. “We understand what football means in a sociological sense. We get it.”
But for the screenwriters, the story transcended the football field. “Everybody understands the story of a kid coming from nowhere, dragged out of his environment and being a fish out of water,” says Clement. “Everybody understands what is at stake, what Santiago is aiming for.”
***
A large question still loomed on the horizon: who would play the role of the endearing and talented central character, Santiago Munez?
“We wanted to cast somebody that wasn't already a huge superstar,” says Matt Barrelle. “It was also really important for us to find a guy who looked like an athlete, was a very good actor, and had that Hispanic/Spanish/Argentinean/Mexican look for his heritage. We also wanted someone who had a charismatic presence on camera, and who looked really innocent. Santiago comes across as very cheeky and innocent in the film, which is really important.”
It was a tall order, and only a truly unique talent could fill it. But Mexico-born actor Kuno Becker fit the bill. An up and coming actor, Becker is one of Mexico's most recognized stars in the international Hispanic television market.
ÒHaving a good actor that was really credible was most important to us,” says Barrelle. “We figured we're making a movie here, not running a sports team. A lot of other sports films have gone for a professional sportsman rather than a good actor.”
The filmmakers auditioned a large cross section of actors. “We auditioned Hispanic actors, all of whom could play football,” says Jefferies. “It was tough out there! We were very, very lucky to find Kuno. He was a perfect mix for us.”
“Kuno is an amazing kid on many different levels,” comments Danny Stepper. “Personally, he is just a great guy. We wanted to surround ourselves with people that were just good to work with, and he's great. And he's a good footballer, which is important. To be credible he had to be a good football player.
“Finally,” concludes Stepper, “from what the girls tell me, he's a pretty good-looking kid. He's a great choice for us.”
Kuno earned the respect and admiration of his director as well: “Nobody works harder than Kuno. He trained hard, played hard, rehearsed over and over and brought so much of himself to the part. He's has an extraordinary talent. You haven't heard of him yet, but you won't be able to stop talking about him. Star quality. Completely,” says Danny Cannon.
For the 27-year-old Becker, the process has been a whirlwind. “It's been crazy,” he says. “I learned so much every day. We tried to make it look as real as possible. I hope its working!”
Becker's fellow actors weren't oblivious to the huge burden on his shoulders. “I felt for Kuno as soon as I met him, because I knew it was a huge undertaking to come to a different country when he doesn't know anyone, and to go straight to Newcastle and be put with all the real players to train,” says Anna Friel, who plays Santiago's love interest. “It's incredibly daunting for anybody, and I think he's handled it incredibly well. And he doesn't complain-he's one of the few actors you'll ever meet that literally will never moan about anything. It's very admirable.”
***
The filmmakers then sought to back up Becker with a stellar supporting cast. Similar to the ensembles of the “Lord of the Rings” and “Harry Potter” films, the filmmakers “wanted to make it about the story, not the actors. That was really important to us-having really talented, no-fuss actors around Kuno,” explains Matt Barrelle. “We wanted to take away from who the actors were and really make a go at the story of `Goal!' the kid's odyssey.”
American actor Alessandro Nivola came aboard to play Gavin Harris, whom Nivola describes as “the new signing. I'm a very expensive player, with expensive tastes and a habitually wild attitude toward my career and my personal life.”
“Gavin provides a sort of bad education for Santiago, but he also has real respect for the guy's talent and he keeps sticking his neck out for him. Gavin is one of those people who often do the right thing by accident which makes for a lot of comic situations. He has a combination of mischief, charm and the ability to get away with murder and have people still like him,” adds Nivola.
Nivola loved that the character was a lovable rogue. “Anytime that you get a chance to surprise an audience and do something unexpected, it's always something to really latch onto as an actor,” says Nivola.
Glen Foy, the ex football player from Scotland who played for Newcastle years ago, suffered an injury and then became a bit of a football talent scout, is played by Stephen Dillane. Dillane explains how his character stumbles upon diamond-in-the-rough Santiago: “Glen's watching his grandson play football, and he spots this young Mexican-born player called Santiago and likes the look of him. He's very excited by how he plays, so he contacts Newcastle and gets Santiago over for a trial. He brings the boy into his house, looks after him for a while and sees him through a few ups and downs and eventually takes him on, becomes his agent,” explains Dillane.
The actor recognizes that Foy has multiple reasons for recruiting Santiago: “If you do a job and you've been excited by what's possible and you see the potential in somebody, you want to see it flower,” explains Dillane. “I guess there's also a kind of egocentric thing-you want to be the one that is responsible in some way for giving the kid the opportunity to fulfill his promise.”
Anna Friel, who was in the early months of a pregnancy during filming and by her own admission has never been to a football match, came on board as Santiago's love interest, Roz. She was impressed by the script: “It flowed very well; it was a nice story with endearing and sympathetic and tangible and accessible characters that all linked together in quite a substantial, believable way,” say Friel. “It seemed different from other sports movies I've seen.”
Roz quickly becomes Santiago's love interest after they meet in the hospital and, according to Friel, “temperatures rise. She's taking his blood pressure, so there's a lot of flirtation from the very beginning.”
If Roz gels with Santiago, she bristles with the flashy Gavin. “She thinks Gavin is a poser,” explains Friel. “She's not all into the Gucci and spending money. She's very down to earth and very unimpressed with fame, which is why I think Santiago's drawn to her. She's a nurse; she leads quite a simple life. She's not a huge football fan and thinks most footballers are jerks, but she changes her mind when she meets Santiago.”
Sean Pertwee took on the role of football agent Barry Rankin. “Barry's a shark. He's self-obsessed; he'd poach anyone from anyone. He'd do anything to get by, to make ends meet really,” says Pertwee.
Barry is the typical agent, who “has the right suits, the right girls, the right cars,” says Pertwee. “He has two guys that he hangs around with, basically to pull girls in, give the boys whatever they want… booze, drugs. He's a bit of a rotter, really.”
Danny Stepper points out that while Barry's “the sleazy agent, and he does all the things that sleazy agents do,” he is essential to Santiago's success. “Barry does hold the keys to the key positions of football, and Glen's trying to negotiate through that to help Santiago find his way in the world of football.”
Cassandra Bell, who admits she “knows nothing” about football, plays Christina, the girlfriend of Gavin Harris. Bell found the character a refreshing change of pace.
“I see her as a strong, sophisticated lady, which is quite unusual for a girlfriend of a footballer. She knows what she wants. She loves her boyfriend dearly; she puts up with quite a bit to a certain extent because she loves him so much,” says Bell. “She knows what this is all about, so she's been in this situation for quite a while. It's just a question of how long she can put up with certain things.”
Of course, when Bell took the role, she had visions of a wardrobe full of tight tops and plenty of makeup. “I was quite surprised,” says Bell. “It's refreshing to turn it around a little bit and see her as a stronger woman and not the usual, stereotypical girlfriend.”
The veteran footballer, who gives Santiago a rough time, Hughie McGowan, is played by Kieran O'Brien. “It's nice to play a hard nut,” smiles O'Brien.
O'Brien's character is ruffled when Santiago arrives on the scene. “McGowan has been in Newcastle a while and he's coming towards the end of his career. He can't make it back into the first team. This young upstart, Santiago, comes along and he's got all the tricks. Everything's going to go for him. Hughie doesn't like it, and it puts his nose out of joint.”
McGowan then wants to see if Santiago's really good enough for the team.
“In the end, of course, he is good enough for the team and I think you see that Hughie appreciates that and just wants to win,” observes O'Brien. “He's not a bad guy. He wants everyone fighting for the club, and however he needs to go about that is what he will do.”
Tony Plana joined the cast as Herman Munez, Santiago's father and a significant influence in his life. At first Herman doesn't support Santiago's dreams of achieving something more than just a steady income from his father's gardening business.
“Herman had to go to extremes to get his family to America. He doesn't quite connect with the idea of Santiago dreaming any higher than he should,” explains Plana. “It's really about a struggle between Herman's very limited dreams about just having his own business and maybe making it to the next socio economic level and Santiago, who has dreams of making it to the top in the football world.”
Herman is a man who has been left by his wife; he's mother and father to his family. His mother, Mercedes (played by Miriam Colon, rounding out the cast), is the `mother' in the family. “It's a bit of a twist on the dynamic of family. It makes for some interesting fireworks,” says Plana.
Also part of the cast are Marcel Iures, Lee Ross, Stephen Graham, and Kevin Knapman.
***
With a cast in place, it was time to hit the field. But first, all football-playing actors would undergo rigorous football training under football consultant and choreographer Andy Ansah. Ansah's experience combines twelve years of hands-on experience as a professional football player in England and six seasons in various production positions on the highly successful English drama “Dream Team.”
Even director Danny Cannon underwent training. “To get myself in shape, I trained for five weeks, three times a week with some of the actors who were semi professionals who played really well in the minor leagues,” says Cannon. “I didn't let them know I was the director at first. I think they figured it out pretty quickly when I was the oldest there and the worst player by far. Seriously, I liked training with them because I thought if I'm going to go out there and push them around all day, then at least I'll do basic training with them and gain their respect first.”
Kuno Becker's training, for obvious reasons, was more intense. He trained for five weeks, four or five hours a day, and also did physical training in the gym. Some actors were trained by Newcastle's youth coach, who brings all the young players up through the system. It gave many of the actors who might have played in their younger days a chance to relearn and master the fundamentals of the sport.
“I played football in school, but it's nothing like playing professionally,” says Becker. “Not that I'm playing professionally now-I'm just trying to improve my technique a little bit and learn the basics, to make it look real.”
Becker did have a double, Danny xxx, who has praised the young actor for his improvement. “It's hard,” says xx. “Speaking to Kuno, it's obvious he really never played much soccer in his life. But he's really improved.”
For Alessandro Nivola, the two weeks of training was a dream come true. “I got more than I ever imagined from the experience,” he says. “It was sort of a boyhood fantasy. It was great because I was able to go back to basics again and do all the simple things and learn to do them really well.”
Orchestrating the entire training effort was Ansah, who made the entire cast look like pros. They couldn't be more thankful for Ansah's skills. “I've got to give a lot of props to Andy for executing all the things I needed,” says Cannon, who also relied on Ansah for much of the football choreography.
“Without Andy, I think this would be impossible because he knows how to play football, and he has a mind for the shots that we needed,” continues Cannon. “He's very patient, very nice, very honest, so it's very easy to work with him. He knows what we're doing and he knows football.”
“Anything that you see on the field is because of Danny Cannon, the governor, and Andy Ansah,” explains Kieran O'Brien.
“Andy's a good guy. He taught me so much. All the people in Newcastle too,” says Kuno Becker, who suffered several minor injuries and general aches and pains from the intense training, along with his fellow cast members. “When I first got there they started to teach me everything-how to pass a ball, how to run with the ball. They've been so good for me.”
Despite all of the preparation, “I don't think anything could prepare the guys for what they had to go through in terms of playing with real players,” says Matt Barrelle. “It's a huge leap from a game on a Saturday afternoon to playing professionally, and these guys do it every day-plus the weight training every night, the special diet. It's stepping up from being an actor who can play football to being a footballer-that is a huge thing.”
***
A hectic shooting schedule for principal photography began January 29, 2005. For producer Mike Jefferies and the other filmmakers, it was a momentous occasion. “It was a three-year journey to get from conception to the first time somebody filmed a scene,” says Jefferies. “That was a big moment.”
“For years we'd been pushing this through… it was amazing to be here, and to see how far we've come and to see how far it's going. It's been an incredible journey,” echoes Danny Stepper.
Production on the rags to riches tale began in Newcastle, where the unit shot in the actual St. James' Park and surrounding facilities. “We shot some fantastic footage in the training room, in the weight room with [Newcastle United captain] Alan Shearer and the guys there,” says Matt Barrelle. “All the players were up for doing this.”
As for the action on the field, Cannon wanted to capture the beauty of the game and also its warrior-like quality. It would be the first time a film unit has shot in a live Premiership game, so the effort required the cooperation of a number of entities and some logistical maneuvering. The production inked a deal with Sky TV to secure some space around the grounds to ensure good camera positions.
“We wanted to shoot it like we wanted to shoot it-really enclosed, like it's not been shot before,” says Matt Barrelle. “We didn't want to grab the TV footage and reuse that again, and try and blow it up. We wanted to have our own cameras capture the action.”
Capturing this brand of fast-paced action wasn't easy, as Danny Cannon can attest. “It's quite an undertaking when you have seven cameras all shooting different things at once at a real game, then days or weeks later shooting the close-ups and pieces of drama with non-players.”
Each game had a different tempo, and its own challenges. “Chelsea was about Kuno's first experience of the big game, so that's the way we shot it-like the first interpretation, first glimpse of the size of football,” says Cannon. “In a later game, Santiago gets his first chance to start. How should he feel? Should we be in his shoes, or outside looking in? You want to plan ahead but a football game is about spontaneous action, it's unpredictable, so you just have to wing it and get the pieces you need bit by bit.”
Once the footage is on film, the action sequence is then recreated a day or two later. “We bring back some actual players playing the match in Newcastle,” says Matt Barrelle. “We also bring back the actors and replace some of the players with the actors and put them in the middle with the action and recreate the actual goal that was scored, or the goal that was nearly scored. It looks pretty amazing.”
Working with Kuno also necessitated a bit of sleight of hand cinematography. “I worked together with Danny, Andy, my double and everybody to make it look real,” explains Becker of his role in the process. “The key was to try to make it look as real as possible.”
Perhaps the most difficult aspect of the Newcastle shoot had nothing to do with football. “The hardest thing has been the weather in Newcastle,” says Cannon. “The unforgiving weather has beaten us up a little bit. It's incredibly hard work, just staying out in the snow and the sleet and the rain and the hail in these sub-zero temperatures, motivating people to play harder and act more intensely when they just want to put their coats back on.”
Even the manufactured conditions were barely tolerable. “We were shooting for two days with the rain machine from seven in the morning to, it felt like about nine at night. Ten-hour shoots two days running, under these rain machines, with the wind blowing,” says Kieran O'Brien. “I saw grown men cry over those two days. There were a lot of cold hands and feet. But it looks amazing.”
Actors that were far less involved with the action on the field sympathized with their fellow thespians. “Hats off to the boys on this because Newcastle is very cold. Sometimes the guys have been outside in minus five for ten hours just solidly playing football in the freezing cold, so all respect to them,” says Anna Friel.
As a result of the brutal conditions, Danny Cannon was as much a cheerleader as a director. “You are trying to capture the same amount of energy and the same amount of skill that's in a real football game. You try and get as emotionally involved,” he explains. “That's been the hardest part for me-keeping everyone energized, keeping that intensity, keeping that need to win. Plus, you're trying to make your actors look like they deserve to be in the Premiereship. I lost my voice a few times directing from the terraces. Some things never change, I found myself shouting the same things I shout to my team on match days.”
Despite the weather, the “inside access” the production afforded was a thrill for cast and crew, who are also fans.
“Just standing on the sideline for the Liverpool game and watching the players warm up and come out and warm down afterwards was great. The athleticism, the skills, what they're able to do with a ball-just standing there was breathtaking,” says Stephen Dillane. “We had a game of football on the Newcastle indoor training field that was good fun. It's been a thrill. I'm a fan, so it's been great just to be around it.”
The use of St. James' Park during real games was another delight for the cast. “It was amazing,” echoes Kuno Becker. “Being in this stadium with fifty two thousand people and filming a scene was unbelievable. Football players are used to it-and that's why I think they cannot just leave the game, because of that feeling.”
Working with the real football stars that made cameos in the film was equally exciting. Real Madrid midfielder David Beckham, one of the sport's most well known talents, made an appearance playing himself in the film. “David was great,” praises Danny Cannon. “There was no pretension to him. He's a very likeable guy. He was very open, and you're 90 percent of the way there when you're open like that-you can be yourself, relax. He did a great job.”
For Kuno Becker, working with Beckham was “awesome. Can you imagine shooting something with him? It was a lot of fun, and I think the audience is going to get into it more because we have a lot of the real players involved.”
If anyone feared the production would distract the real Newcastle United squad as filming took place around them during the heart of their season, they needn't have. “They won five in a row while we were up there,” says Matt Barrelle. “It was great for us that Newcastle was winning while we were shooting. The atmosphere was fantastic, and we came up with some fantastic footage. Everybody was very nice to us around the town.”
After a stop in London for the filming of some party scenes and scenes at Gavin's flat, and filming at Pinewood Studios, the production moved to Los Angeles for the last two weeks of filming.
The sunny breezes of the West Coast weren't just a welcome change for the cast and crew…they were essential to the story. “Having the sun in L.A. was very important for us, because we needed the contrast,” Barrelle points out. “The sun here, the grey gloomy clouds of Newcastle.”
The unit shot at the Pacific Design Centre in West Hollywood. The production also shot at a mansion in Beverly Hills, among other locations.
For the football scenes, the production worked with players from Hollywood United Football Club. “The Hollywood United Football club is made up of a lot of English footballers who live in and around L.A. They all congregate and come together,” explains Andy Ansah.
* * *
As principal photography came to a close, the cast had time to reflect on the experience, and give kudos to their team captain, director Danny Cannon.
“We were so lucky to have him because it's so hard to find somebody that really loves and knows everything about football, and is a good director,” says Kuno Becker. “That combination is rare, and we had it here.”
The film required a director who could inject juice into the action scenes while understanding the nuances of the dramatic material. “This is not just a football movie,” says Stephen Dillane. “It's about a hero who comes through and succeeds. He resists the temptations and goes through his trials and tribulations. It shows how much you've got to hold yourself together to get through everything and what's required to actually achieve something, however talented you are.”
“You can watch football and soccer on TV any day,” says Kuno Becker. “This film is more about telling a story. Even if you don't like football it doesn't matter because you're going to like the film. It's a story about universal feelings.”
“What we wanted to do with `Goal!' was create a story that really moved people,” says Mike Jefferies. “We wanted to make people excited, make them sad, make them thrilled, make them laugh-and football happens to be the backdrop.”
***
The filmmakers hope the film-and the football-make a splash in the U.S. market. “Soccer is the number one participation sport in the U.S.,” points out Mike Jefferies. “So the base needed to grow it is there, and the numbers. The level of interest is high-it's about cracking the media market here in the U.S.”
“Professional soccer is not marketed as much as the NBA and NFL,” says Danny Stepper. “But now, with the tremendous work that has been done by major league soccer and hopefully the work of our movie and the work that FIFA is doing in the U.S., there's hope. The climate is perfect. I mean, the game is incredible, and if people can see the game on the scale and magnitude that we see it in Europe, how can they not love it?”
“We hope to crack the U.S. market,” says Steve Barrelle. “I mean, America needs a good football film. Anything we can do to help is our pleasure.”
 These production notes provided by Artisan Entertainment. |
RSS Feed XML Sitemap HTML Sitemap Privacy Policy
