the star and the player: the perfect team
How does an actor who has hardly ever played the game turn into a footballer? That was the task facing the star of Goal! - Kuno Becker. Fortunately he had help from ex-pro Andy Ansah, a man widely acknowledged as the best at transferring football onto the big screen.
FIFA.com talks to Becker - and Ansah - the man who helped him recover from two broken ankles to playing with Beckham, Zidane, Raul and the rest…..
FIFA.com: Kuno - How good a footballer were you before Goal!
Kuno Becker: I am a terrible player! It's all thanks to Andy Ansah - I don't play football, but Andy made me look like I play. Without him there is no way I would have been able to do it. These guys have been doing this since they were three years old. How am I going to get there in four months? Training. A lot of training! But we knew that if we didn't make the football scenes believable then the audience is not going to accept the story. The story is the most important thing, but if the football scenes are not at the best level, people are not going to believe the story.
Andy - How did you train him for the role?
Andy Ansah: Sheer hard work. I've been in Hollywood with Kuno - I was even with him on holiday in Mexico! He can't get rid of me! But I know how hard you have to work to make football look good on film. I retired from football at the age of 30 after playing professionally in England with a bad knee injury and I said, "I believe I can be an actor". I joined Dream Team, which is a football drama as an extra and I started to spend time with writers and directors and I started thinking, "this isn't right, the set dressing's all wrong, the football's wrong, the angles are wrong". They started to listen to me and within a year I became a producer on the show.
You had 12 years as a professional footballer, do you recognize the characters in Goal!
Andy Ansah: Definitely. The journey is great - unlike other movies it goes to the other side of football. When players come on trial at football clubs you don't generally accept them because that player is coming to take your career, your wage. If he gets signed, someone else is going to lose their contract. That's how you look at it. So you give them a hard time. I've seen triallists come in and they say they're here for a month, you give them a rough time and you don't even see them the next day. But every now and again, like you see in the film, you get someone who stands out. They might do one bit of skill and they get respect - like Santiago does in the film. The other thing it shows you is how people hide things in order to make it. Santiago has asthma but he is afraid to admit it and lose his chance.
Kuno - How did you first hear about the film?
KB: I read the script, met the director and the producers. I thought the script was great, it was a different role for me. But it was a big challenge for me - it was super-hard, I broke both my ankles and my nose in the process, but making the film believable was our biggest concern.
How did you get the part?
KB: Well - it wasn't easy - I nearly missed out because of my broken ankles! I went to an audition in Los Angeles and they said, "Look, we know you can act, but can you play football?" They gave me trial for three weeks - I trained too hard and broke my ankles. On the day of the trial I just couldn't do it and I didn't get the part. Danny Cannon (the director) was very disappointed. When I was walking off the pitch I thought, "no, I've got to show them", so I went back and challenged Danny to try to get the ball from me. I had learnt a few things about keeping the ball - he couldn't get it off me so I got the part…
The filming of the live footage has broken new ground...
AA: They way we've done it is tremendous. The real footage of the games is intercut with our set-ups. We've got real football people involved in this movie, but we're not just throwing football in for the sake of it. It's the story that matters. The football is just a continuation of the story. The action that you see is so good because we have access - we had FIFA on board, we had adidas, we had Newcastle, Beckham, Raul, Zidane, Eriksson and a director who loves football. It's made by football people so when you do see football it compliments the story.
KB: We had footballers acting and actors playing football - and it worked! David Beckham was great, Zinedine Zidane was great, they were very natural, easy going, having fun for a couple of hours. To have them in the film gives us a sense of reality which you don't see usually. Most of the time you just see doubles in films pretending to be someone else. But in this one we have all the best footballers in the world in front of the cameras. People are going to believe the story because of that.
How much has the backing from FIFA helped?
KB: It has made a huge difference. They are giving so much access to teams like Real Madrid and all their superstars. This is the first time it has happened. It will give us a sense of reality that we don't see in other films.
AA: FIFA made us credible. Many other parties looked at it and said, well if FIFA are involved we need to be involved too.
What can we expect from the two parts of Goal! to come?
KB: When I finished watching the first film, I thought the second one had better be amazing because the first one is so good. We have a big responsibility with the second one because the first one is emotional, it's so exciting. But I think the second one is going to be even better.
