SIFF: THE BEAUTIFUL GAME
In the SIFF movie, The Beautiful Game, the struggles of disability, race, class, and gender all were portrayed through the lives of Africans who learned to deal with and eventually triumph over these struggles through the game of soccer. Every one of these Africans was born into a poverty stricken family and environment, but that didn’t stop them one bit from finding something that would take that pain of the struggle away and that could give them the confidence and discipline to keep going in life. That something was soccer.
Nearly 40% of Africans live below the poverty line, yet almost every single kid in Africa plays soccer (The Beautiful Game). Some create makeshift balls out of wrapping plastic bags upon plastic bag, a majority of them play barefoot, and the field usually is the street or essentially any patch of surface available (the movie showed them playing in areas where water was about knee height others were shown playing in straight mud and dirt and others playing under overpasses of major roads). This was incredibly intriguing for me to see because it made me realized how privileged I was to be playing on nice turf fields and with all the equipment pretty much readily available for me; it really made me appreciate how they play and how their lifestyle was. It didn’t matter to them that they were playing in these less than ideal conditions because they were doing what they loved to do. One player said it kept his mind of the conditions he was living in, which is why he loved playing and played it every day. Soccer essentially allowed them to enjoy their lives regardless of the struggle they were in.
One of the things I found extremely disturbing during the film was the fact that such a large number of talented Africans players were often taken advantage of by people who posed as agents and managers. These people come and scope out the talented players and tell them they can work with them to get them exposed to major teams and the players get excited and confident, so they give these “agents” all of their and their family’s savings to get overseas to play and the “agent” tells them they are going to talk with the teams and the players never hear from them again. One player said that he had given one of these fakes nearly $10,000 to play in Europe and the “manager” left him behind and never talked to him again. Another player said this happens far too often because there are some people with immense talent and they are so determined to get out of the current living conditions that they will take the first opportunity given to them and put full belief that it will go through. It’s appalling and rather disgusting this happens so frequently because those “agents” are killing their dreams to make it big as a soccer player and essentially their hope and confidence that they will get out of those conditions, as well as the chance to help their family financially; everything about it is just wrong.
When in Africa and you are born with a disability you are deemed useless by society and are often ignored. When a pretty talented player was diagnosed with polio and lost his ability to move one of his legs he didn’t succumb to this label of the disabled and he didn’t allow others, who were disabled, in his community to be seen like this either. Soon after being diagnosed, he started a camp/school that allowed children with a disability to participate in and learn the game of soccer. He said, “All they [the people with disabilities] want to do is to feel a part of something, to know that they are able to do something.” He essentially wanted them to know and actually see and feel that they aren’t by any means useless. This was also portrayed in the movie Murderball with the players who are in wheelchairs, but find rugby as a way to cope with their disability; more specifically when Zupan goes to the hospital to recruit new players for the team and finds the guy who not long before was paralyzed and you could tell from his face and willingness to try the chair (as well as hitting something with the chair) that it gave him hope and internal confidence about being in a wheelchair and moving on with life regardless of being disabled.
Every person, no matter your race, class, if you have a disability or not, if you are a woman or a man, should/needs to find something that can take their mind off the real world for a little while and do that something every day. It will improve your outlook on life because you will have less stress and worries when you come out of doing that activity. Whenever I play soccer, even if it is just juggling the ball for a little bit, the rest of my day is without a doubt better; I get in that zone and it’s like nothing else matters in the world except that moment and its incredibly refreshing.
