This is the first installment of “Now Streaming,” a new feature at Hudson River Blue that looks at a movie or streaming series related to soccer. Every review will give you essential information – how to watch it, how long it runs, and if it’s family-friendly. Every review will be graded on the 10-point Player Rating scale: A 6 is fine, a 7 is good, an 8 is excellent, and a 9 is a golazo. And every review will try to explain why you might want to watch it: We want to give you the vibes more than a thumbs-up or thumbs-down.
• Player Rating: 8.2
• Stream: Netflix
• Length: 4 episodes, 66-77 mins each
• Audience: Ages 13 and older
Beckham works because David Beckham’s story is so good: Who doesn’t want to be a fly on the wall in the Manchester United locker room in the late 90s? The doc was made with the full cooperation of the Beckhams, so you ain’t going to learn where the bodies are buried. But the archival footage – plus some juicy interviews with Diego Simeone, Figo, Gary Neville, and other heavies from the time – make the series worth watching.
It would be easy to dismiss Beckham as hagiography, a soft-focus documentary about a hyper-famous soccer player and his hyper-famous wife. After all, the four-part Netflix series was made with the full cooperation of the Beckhams, and the few flaws that are revealed only serve to make the couple look relatable and human, which in turn makes them seem only more magnificent.
But that’s to miss the point of Beckham. You don’t watch the series because you expect director Fisher Stevens, who started acting in 1981 at the age of 18, to reveal a scandal or ugly truth about the power couple. You watch it because David and Victoria Beckham were at the white-hot center of an enthralling moment in the history of soccer and pop culture, and the best way to tell it is for Stevens to strap us into the Wayback Machine and set the dial to the 1990s and early 2000s, when lad mags drove the news cycle, Cool Britannia ruled the world, and everybody on the planet wanted to play for Manchester United.
Beckham brings us into the locker rooms of United and Real Madrid when those teams were at the heights of their powers. Because of David Beckham’s cooperation, Stevens has access to Sir Alex Ferguson, Gary Neville, Rio Ferdinand, Ryan Giggs, Figo, Ronaldo (the first), and Florentino Pérez. Those long and juicy interviews – plus the archival footage of some of the greatest games in the history of soccerball – are alone worth the price of admission.
For example: The interview with Diego Simeone in which he was asked if Beckham deserved the red card he was shown when they tussled in the 1998 FIFA World Cup. “Absolutamente no,” the Argentine responded while flashing a million-dollar smile. It’s the perfect conclusion to one of the most infamous moments in World Cup history.
Beckham | Official Trailer
The fact is it’s thrilling to relive the 1999 UEFA Champions League Final, when United faced Bayern Munich at Camp Nou in Barcelona. Bayern took the lead in the sixth minute, and defended their one-goal advantage through 84 minutes of regulation time, only for United to even the score in the 91st minute on a David Beckham corner kick. Less than two minutes later, he delivered another corner kick that pinged around in the box before Ole Gunnar Solskjær knocked in the winning goal. You couldn’t script a more Hollywood ending to a game.
It was because of performances like that one that made David Beckham a football star. And it was because of the performance art that was his life – the haircuts, the fashion shoots, the wedding suit in a shade of purple that was as more Barney the Dinosaur than Roman Emperor – that makes him such a compelling subject. He not only delivered during some of the biggest games of his era, the off-field behavior that was viewed as provocative then seems only more outlandish now.
But you won’t find out where the bodies are buried. The series touches on the affair he had with his personal assistant after moving to Madrid, but no names are named. When confronted David Beckham acts appropriately contrite.
You have to accept that this series won’t press that point. Instead, you gain a kind of sideways insight into David Beckham when you discover that he is even more obsessive about his clothes than you could have possibly thought, with a bedroom-sized dressing room where the museum-quality lighting softly illuminates the outfits he sets out for himself days in advance.
Beckham isn’t a tell-all, it’s storytelling. It helps that the narrative arc which is the Beckham’s life is so extraordinary that non-fans who couldn’t tell their Manchester United from their Manchester City will enjoy it. And the straight-talk interviews are clean enough to watch with a middle-schooler.
Besides, the Beckhams are easy on the eyes. Come for the soccer footage and the interviews, stay for the glimpses into the life of a man who remains at the top of his game 11 years after retiring from football.
