Next Goal Wins
**This piece was written during the 2023 SAG-AFTRA strikes. Without the labor of the actors currently on strike, the movies being covered here wouldn’t exist.
I feel like the main way this works completely is if it’s approached in a different way than Taika Waititi tells this true story. There are things that work really well here, but Waititi only half gets the underdog sports elements of the film correct. In a way, he’s taken the “Cool Runnings” approach, where any success the American Samoa soccer team has is a reason to celebrate, but with Michael Fassbender’s angry, cynical coach, Thomas Rongen, you almost would like to see it be more of a “Bad News Bears” type movie. Overall, I enjoyed “Next Goal Wins,” but that’s more because of how much I just innately enjoy the genre than how successfully Waititi brings this story to life.
When you follow a team that feels perpetually inept, sometimes you get to the point where you’ll take even the most minor win. Sometimes, it’s a last minute miss by the opposing team to give you your only win of the year. Sometimes, it’s being so bad you get the chance to draft a generational talent. For the American Samoa men’s soccer team, all they want is a single goal. In 2001’s World Cup Qualifier tournament, they set an unparalleled standard to sports awfulness by allowing 31 goals in a single game. Ten years later, they don’t give up quite that many goals, but they’re still unable to score one of their own. The US national association of soccer sees this as the perfect opportunity for Rongen as a coach, not because they think he can turn them around, but they think the situation will humble him, and release some of the anger he has bottled up. In a way, the pairing of team and coach is made in heaven, but not in a way either will recognize as they move towards the team’s latest attempt at the World Cup.
The film begins with Waititi as an American Samoa priest who is setting the stage of the story. Right away, it sets things up to be a silly comedy, but this isn’t the same thing as, say, “The Replacements” or the aforementioned “Bad News Bears.” Waititi and co-writer Iain Morris seem genuine engaged in respecting the culture and people of American Samoa, even if the situations we see unfold are ridiculous and probably don’t put the people in the best light. There’s something genuine about the indigenous people of this film, whether it’s Oscar Kightley as Tavita, the head of the island’s soccer program, Uli Latukefu as Nicky Salapu, the goalie who gave up the 31 goals in 2001, and especially Kaimana as Jaiyah, a young woman in the middle of transitioning, and thus legally eligible to be on the team. She is ultimately the heart of the team, and gives us a feeling of the passion of the players to be themselves, and be happy, even if that hasn’t translated to success on the field. She is the film’s MVP.
I have mixed feelings on Fassbender in the film. He’s great at the anger, which has been at a boil for years as his professional, and personal, life has been in upheaval. I think he has great moments in the film, sometimes relative to the humor of the story, but more often than not when it comes to his dealings with other characters, especially Jaiyah and Tavita. I also think he nails his character’s big speech that ultimately turns the tide of their game, and his relationship with the team. But something feels off about his approach to the material; he’s definitely intended to be an asshole who softens to his situation, and he can play that great, but his work doesn’t really help when Waititi doesn’t seem to understand how to make this film sit in the sports film genre. I did connect with it, though, more than I probably should have.
