How wonderful it is to discover this, thanks to directors Rachel Ramsay and James Erskine and many of the players who took part in this historic and, until now, largely ignored and brushed under the carpet, forgotten piece of incredible sports history.
This is a massively entertaining and informative documentary about the 1971 Women’s World Cup that took place in Mexico City and Guadalajara, two of its biggest stadiums and drawing crowds of 110,000 attendees and shows how deep the ignorance, systemic sexism and general fear shown by the male football governing bodiesgoes.
We are so fortunate that so much footage of the competition still exists and Ramsay and Erskine do a tremendous job intertwining the brilliant interviews of the players now and then with photographs and film of the tournament from 1971.
Susanne Augustessen playing for Denmark at Copa 71
What a travesty that it had been lost but how lucky we are that these directors have brought this to the attention of the public in 2024, at a time when Women’s football is at its most popular.
Bring on these lost stories so we may learn about our history and hopefully not make the same mistakes again. Shame on you male dominated football organisations, may your attitudes be buried along with the dinosaurs. You are not welcome here.
What is it with auteurs making long films and them being ultimately disappointing? Scorsese’s last 2 outings The Irishman and Killers of the Flower Moon both clocked in over the 3 hour mark (209 and 206 minutes respectively) and were quite unsatisfying. I love Scorsese by the way, his contribution to cinema as a director and a king of restoration and general support of cinema is unparalleled. I loved Ari Aster’s first 2 films Hereditary (127 minutes) and Midsommar (148 minutes & 171 minutes for the director’s cut) but really didn’t like Beau is Afraid (179 minutes). Lanthimos’ previous films: The Lobster (118 minutes) was reasonably enjoyable but The Killing of a Sacred Deer (121 minutes), The Favourite (120 minutes) and Poor Things (142 minutes) were all excellent. Kinds of Kindness (165 minutes) was enjoyable-ish but I failed to see what the point of the film was. I wasn’t bored at all, merely frustrated.
Willem Dafoe and Margaret Qualley in Kinds of Kindness
Spilt into three parts, The Death of R.M.F., R.M.F. is Flying and R.M.F. Eats a Sandwich and described as a triptych fable, the core group of actors featured all play different parts in the three stories. They are all fabulous with the great Jesse Plemons winning the Best Actor Award at Cannes for his performance(s), Yorgos’s muse, the excellent Emma Stone, the always ace, Willem Dafoe, the layered and enchanting Margaret Qualley, who here has an ethereal quality, Hong Chau who is always great, Mamoudou Athie, who’s acting I rated highly from the tv show Archive 81 and Joe Alwyn, who I didn’t know of before, not being a Swiftie ;O).
I saw this at the Sydney Film Festival and the audience seemed to love it, laughing out loud at much of the film, unfortunately I didn’t click with the humour, which is a surprise as I was really looking forward to this as I was for Scorsese’s last 2 and Ari Aster’s last one.
I was left feeling excluded, maybe I’m just too dumb, but I didn’t get it. What was Lanthimos trying to say?
The tone poem music written by Jerskin Hendrix, who also scored Poor Things to great acclaim, creates a jarring, unsettling mood with haunting voices seemingly crying in agony. It really is something and maybe the part of the film I enjoyed or appreciated most.
Emma Stone and Jesse Plemons in Kinds of Kindness
The actors appeared to have a great time and the making of the film would have been highly rewarding for all involved, unfortunately it didn’t translate to this viewer. I get it, all art is subjective and I’m defo not mad at them for making it, there is space for everything (mostly) and it’s not all for me.
For the longest time I haven’t put any reviews out for films that I didn’t like as there is too much negativity and trolling and crying online like “boo hoo, it was rubbish” but I don’t want to contribute and I hope that’s not what I’m doing here. I am glad that these filmmakers are making the films they wish to make and maybe a repeat viewing in a few years may yield some more meaning. It wasn’t unentertaining. I just felt a bit left out. The film paces along nicely and never seems too long or bloviated.
Don’t get it twisted, I love me a long movie. I recently watched Yi Yi, a Taiwanese film by Edward Yang that was 173 minutes and one of my all-time favourite films is Once Upon a Time in America by Sergio Leone and the last version I watched was 251 minutes and I loved every minute of it. So, I’m not against long films in the slightest. If there be substance, I be involved.
Margaret Qualley in Kinds of Kindness
I haven’t read anything about it yet but I’m sure there are some smarter cookies than me out there all up on the inter web who can decipher the meanings. More power to them. I’ll have a read and see if my mind is changed but ultimately this one didn’t do it for me. :O(.