"On June 5, 2015, the film made its North American premiere at 10 movie theaters in New York, Phoenix, Los Angeles, Washington D. C., Kansas City, Miami, Minneapolis, Dallas, Houston, and Philadelphia. It grossed $319."
The above quote is from the IMDB trivia section on this film. Additionally, the film ended up losing pretty much all the money spent to make it! But, at the same time, the film is reasonably entertaining and features a pretty amazing cast, such as Gerard Depardieu, Tim Roth and Sam Neill. It also features some nice scenes of Paris circa 1930 as well as come great location shots. So what is the problem with this movie?
Well, the problem is that the film is a tribute to the wonderfulness of FIFA, the international body that governs and oversees football (soccer to us Americans). So why is this a problem? Well, the film came out just after FIFA and its leaders were embroiled in a scandal and arrests were made for bribery and more! So, it's not too surprising that revenues were down for the film. But the problem goes much deeper than this. Apparently most of the cost to make the film was actually provided by FIFA...making this essentially a propaganda film...probably made to try to distract the public from FIFA's legal troubles. And, the public seems to have realized this and they stayed away from the movie in droves! It also didn't help that the film not only talks about the early days of FIFA and the first World Cup but then jumps ahead to today...extolling FIFA's virtues but NEVER seriously addressing the scandals...many of which had broken well before the film debuted! And, sadly, some of the folks the film seems to applaud are those who were later sanctioned by FIFA for fraud.
If you completely ignore the propaganda aspects of the movie, I must admit that it's reasonably entertaining...though a bit sterile and uninvolving. It really lacks heart and warmth and the characters seem more like caricatures much of the time. But purely for the look of the film and SOME of the acting, I'm giving it a 3. It's not all that good and is an apparent attempt to distract the public...but it's not 100% bad as you watch the movie.
