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Goal! hits the back of the net and is an early candidate for the funnest movie of the summer.
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75The movie works because it is, above all, sincere. It's not sports by the numbers. The starring performance by Kuno Becker is convincing and dimensional and we begin to care for him.
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Most sports films are also fish-out-of-water stories, and this one qualifies as both.
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Has an awful title, a bland hero and a predictable story - but it also has a nice blast of English atmosphere.
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67There's enough realism to keep a soccer buff like me happy, but the film is aimed at the young at heart, and I think they'll love it.
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67How much viewers care about what happens in Goal! is directly proportionate to how much they care about soccer, because decent execution aside, there's an underdog fantasy movie just like this one for every sport.
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63An unknown commodity to anyone who doesn't follow telenovelas, Becker is sure to be a big star and has already signed on for two sequels. Apart from being scorching hot, he's enormously sympathetic in dramatic scenes.
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63A sports movie for people who may not care about sports but can't resist a heart-tugging underdog story.
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63A big success in Europe, the film has already spawned two sequels, the first of which is due to be released in the fall.
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63The film is capably acted and somewhat inspiring.
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60A slickly mounted slice of can-do nonsense.
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The cast, all around, is sterling. There's only one thing they don't need to bring back for the sequels, and that's the movie's appetite for every sports cliché there ever was.
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Goal seems destined to be an ongoing soccer-themed soap opera, but it's one that only the game's biggest enthusiasts likely will find compelling.
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The appealing young man's tribulations are predictable, his triumph inevitable; while he gets respect, we get another Rocky-style dose of emotional uplift, cloaked in the usual game-day clichés.
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If you can abide booming orchestral punches during verbal confrontations and ubiquitous Adidas product placement, you'll be rewarded by exciting soccer sequences and the joy of watching a likable character triumph on a global stage.
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40Despite employing every cliché in the sports-movie handbook, Goal! The Dream Begins tells a reasonably engaging story.
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As the clichés mount, Danny Cannon directs as if he's the one on trial, teasing tension out of every pass and dribble. Most irritating of all is his determination to paint British soccer as a gentleman's game, a notion United's real fans would no doubt treat with the scorn it deserves.
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40The trouble with Goal!, which -- horror of horrors -- is the first of a trilogy, is that it's neither a persuasive story nor a satisfying display of soccer.
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38Handsomely shot and with a likable lead in Kuno Becker, it also suffers from a script so outrageously generic you could buy it at Costco.
User score distribution:
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Positive: 8 out of 11
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Mixed: 1 out of 11
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Negative: 2 out of 11
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8I'm a massive fan of football so I loved this movie. Not exactly funny but still a great movie for football (or soccer) fans.
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YolyR.10