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GOAL II: LIVING THE DREAM

 ABOUT THE MOVIE

Genre: Drama
Starring: Kuno Becker, Alessandro Nivola, Anna Friel, David Beckham
Director: Jaume Collet-Serra
Rating: PG
Year Made: 2007

 

 


 SPECIAL FEATURES

- Exclusive Access: All Areas
- Deleted Scenes
- Bloopers
- Audio Commentary Director Jaume Collet-Serra and Producer Mike Jefferies

 

 


 TECHNICAL SPECIFICATIONS

Languages: English/Portuguese
Thai/Japanese
Subtitles: English/Chinese/Bahasa/Malay/Thai/
Spanish/Portuguese/Korean
Aspect Ratio: 2.35:1
Sound: Dolby Digital 5.1
Running Time: 1 hr 55 mins
Region Code: 3
Distributor: Scorpio East

 

 

SYNOPSIS: 

Footballer Santiago Munez's story continues in this fast-paced, action-packed movie. Newcastle United's favourite player reaches superstardom - and every footballer's dream - when he's transferred to Real Madrid to play in the UEFA European Champions League alongside David Beckham, Zinedine Zidane, Raul, Guti and Iker Casillas. As Santiago basks in the glory, acclaim and money, he discovers the ugly face of success - one that threatens to destroy everything he's worked for and everyone he loves.

MOVIE REVIEW

The first Goal movie brought plenty of cheers to football fans, who celebrated the coming of a decent movie about the beloved Beautiful Game. And it didn't disappoint, with a likable hero in Santiago Munez (Kuno Becker) in a rags to riches story, nifty footwork and camerawork, locales familiar to English Premier League fans, the seamless combination of real world match footage with fictional shots taken on match days, and access to seldom seen areas in and around the stadiums.

With the first movie centered on the domestic football league following Newcastle's season, the sequel brings us to the Spanish La Liga, and firmly the spotlight of matches put on Europe's Champions League games. Given that this sequel is delayed, you'd still get to see Real Madrid's ex-galacticos like Roberto Carlos, Zinedine Zidane, David Beckham and Ronaldo, besides mainstayers like Iker Caillas and Raul Gonzalez, amongst others (see if you can spot McManaman!)

In a player swap deal with Michael Owen, we see Munez head to Real Madrid, in probably almost every footballer's dream to play for one of the biggest clubs in the world. And of course with hard nosed coach Rudi Van Der Merwe (Rutger Hauer) at the helm, our new recruit has to prove his worth before being handed some first team duties. But good friend and ex-Newcastle player Gavin Harris (Alessandro Nivola) is on hand at the club (reference the first movie shall we) to provide Munez some opportunity for action, especially when Harris is running afoul with Rudi for his lost form.

The football sequences here are rather straightforward, and more of the same we saw in the first movie, save for some spectacular, probably CG-ed movies like the volleys, overhead kicks and diving headers. The number of matches being featured too is much less, as the story wanted to focus on our player's life outside of football.

You know, by putting all the press reports that you read day in day out of boozing, incessant partying, easy models who don't bat an eyelid looking to get between the sheets with the players, flashy sports cars, designer togs, mansions with numerous rooms, and the likes. Munez lives the dream in material wealth, although this starts to get into his head and takes a toil with his relationships, especially with girlfriend Roz (Anna Friel). There are numerous subplots put into Goal 2, but most times they are superficially touched upon for the sole purpose of covering the ground, and then forgotten conveniently, like the paparazzi photo-journalist, and various incidents on and off the pitch.

What I thought slowed the movie down further, was the injection of Munez's typical stepbrother brat from hell, and mother, who were conspicuously absent in the first movie, then reintroduced here just to amplify the moments that try to touch the heart (like in the first movie with the dad and grandmother), but one without which I feel would not make much of a difference. Couple this family reunion-reconciliation of sorts, together with his struggles with injury and attempts to shake off the "super-sub" tag, Munez has his hands full.

While the other real life players do not have much speaking lines (or none at all), you can't help but to feel both Kuno Becker and Alessandro Nivola being fish out of water in the Real Madrid dressing room, where either the charismatic players will undoubtedly get the audience attention with their antics or camaraderie which shines through. The movie too seemed to like David Beckham, given plenty of scenes, befitting probably of his real last hurrah at the club before having left them this summer.

So the scoreline at the end, well, it's actually living in the dream. Given that the ending is one of the technical worst that can happen, leading straight to the third installment, let's hope that the concluding chapter really does see the light of day. Not as polished as the first one with the novelty factor wearing off, but let's judge the series as a whole once the sequel screens. Excellent soundtrack once again, coupled with the usual product placement shots for Adidas.

SPECIAL FEATURES :

This Code 3 DVD contains a number of extras that will please fans of the movie.

First, Exclusive Access: All Areas (12:17) is the making of documentary, with short cast and crew interviews, recounting how the famed Santiago Bernabeu Stadium's dressing room was opened for the crew to film in, and how Real Madrid allowed unprecedented access to the actual players during filming. Goal 3 with its premise of the World Cup was strongly hinted at. The gem here is the dissection of how the games featured were actually composed and filmed.

A total of 9 Deleted Scenes (combined runtime of 9:20) are included in the DVD, with some that are incomplete with unpolished sound and special effects (see if you can spot those green screen boundaries), or just containing the effects placeholders. No commentary provided though to inform you why they were removed, besides the obvious edited for run time reasons.

A 3 minute Bloopers reel shows the usual missed lines, accidental trips and such. No further insights here, except to see how the actors fumble, smile, laugh and swear when they screw up.

Fans should load up the Audio Commentary with Director Jaume Collet-Serra and Producer Mike Jefferies, as they share valuable nuggets of football trivia throughout the movie, highlighting some art imitating life moments. They do explain technicalities about the shooting of the movie, as well as reveal some of the moments outside the story during their day to day production. Those interested in how the games were shot should also pay attention to their discussion about what actually happened, and which players were replaced for our actors to take their place, but sometimes, they do get quite pedestrian and drift into football commentary about the game in progress.

Rounding up, trailers for Underdog, Wild Hogs and Invisible auto-start when the disc is inserted and after the selection of the menu language, but thankfully can be skipped.

AUDIO/VISUAL:

Visual transfer is pristine, though with the footballing moments, you can just about make out the artificial CGI shots. With the 5.1 audio set up, it is without a doubt an artificial step closer to being inside the cauldron of the Bernabeu stadium amongst the Real Madrid fans jeering (remember, Gavin Harris is still "shite"), or cheering, their football sons on.

MOVIE RATING:



DVD RATING :

Review by Stefan Shih

 
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This review is made possible with the kind support from Scorpio East

 


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