The World Cup of Cinema - Switzerland

Amateur Teens 

(Screen capture image taken from A Film Company production/ Distributed by Synergetic Distribution)

Switzerland proved to be a rather challenging selection to complete. The first complication stemmed from the fact that several different languages are spoken in the country (mainly French, German and Italian) so it’s not uncommon for actors and actresses from other nations to sneak into Swiss cinema. For this country, confirming the ‘theatrical performer’ portion of my checklist was more frustrating than normal. Take for instance the 2010 film Songs of Love and Hate. This film was shot in Switzerland. Its director Katalin Gödrös was born in Switzerland and, based off what I’ve read, has spent a decent portion of her life living there. But when I got to the cast which included Dutch actor Jeroen Willems and a trio of German actresses; Sarah Horvath, Luisa Sappelt and Mira Elisa Goeres, it suddenly dawned on me that this film wouldn’t work. There is a part of me that really hates excluding a film on the basis of such technicalities and yet I know that if I go ahead and select it, I run the risk of having someone complain ‘hey these people are German, not Swiss’, so either way I can’t win.

The World Cup of Cinema - New Zealand

Black Sheep 

(Screen capture image taken from a Live Stock Films production/ Distributed by Dimension Extreme)

New Zealand was one of those countries that I checked off my list just for the sake of having it done. And why not? After all I felt very confident that they would win the Oceania region. Ever since Australia left they’ve been the heavy favorites to win the confederation, which in this case would have left them one goofy win away from furtively slipping into the World Cup. Maybe in a ‘normal’ world I might have waited to see who would win the region first and then possibly who that team would be paired up with in the inter-continental playoff before choosing to write a critique. But given the delays caused by the pandemic, this just didn’t seem like a good idea.

The World Cup of Cinema - Japan

Seven Samurai 

(Screen capture image taken from a Toho Company production/ Distributed by The Criterion Collection)

Japan was another one of those ‘easy’ countries when it came to completing this project. Not only does the country produce a huge amount of films per year, but a good portion of their work is accessible to people living on the other side of the Pacific. Albeit much like the United States, this is a country where there was so much to choose from that I didn’t even know where to begin. Between the anime work of Hayao Miyazaki, Satoshi Kon, and Katsuhiro Otomo, the cult films of Nobuhiko Ôbayashi, the yakuza films of Takeshi Kitano, the sadistic, graphic fare of Takashi Miike, as well as the work of more ‘classic’ auteurs like Yasujirō Ozu and Akira Kurosawa, one doesn’t have to dig too deep into Japanese cinema culture before they’re confronted with an embarrassment of riches. Given how diverse and eclectic its cinema product can be, some may view my selection of Kurosawa’s 1954 masterpiece as a rather unimaginative, conventional pick.

The World Cup of Cinema - United States

Slacker 

(Screen capture image taken from a Detour FilmProduction film)

A funny thing happened halfway through the completion of this project. I suddenly realized that I hadn’t done a film from my own native country yet. I suppose that this was the consequence of initially focusing on the countries that actually qualified for the 2018 tournament. All kidding aside the fact that our ‘soccer’ team missed that tournament didn’t really bother me, and I refuse to get excessively overdramatic about it. I’m not the type of person who places much significance on the outcome of a sporting match. At the end of the day who wins and losses these games are trifling affairs. The men from our team did the best that they could and even though things didn’t go quite the way that they had hoped, I have no reason not to wish them peace and happiness in life.

The World Cup of Cinema - Hungary

Panelkapcsolat (The Prefab People) 

(Screen capture image taken from a Mafilm production/ Distributed by Facets Video)

I had not given much thought before to how weird it is to execute a process whereby football matches played all over the world would dictate the films that I watch. I always felt a bit conflicted about how to deal with countries that existed on the fringe of being good enough to qualify for the World Cup. One approach was to just be patient and see how they do in the qualifying rounds before making any firm decisions. The biggest advantage to this strategy is that it can save a lot of time and unnecessary hassle. For instance, I actually had a selection in mind for Ireland, even though I hadn’t done much research into how I would go about accessing the film. However after Ireland lost an early qualifying match to Luxembourg, I was able to just … casually take this film off my to-do list and not worry about it. Someday I may watch that film, but in the lead up to the publication of these critiques, I didn’t want to waste time on countries that obviously wouldn’t make it.