Hero: The Official Film of the 1986 FIFA World Cup (1987)

The official documentary record of the 1986 soccer World Cup, highlighting the Captain of Argentina, Diego Maradona.

Director:

Tony Maylam

Writer:

Tony Maylam

Stars:

Michael Caine, Viv Anderson, John Barnes

Cast

Credited cast:
Michael Caine	...	Narrator (voice)
Rest of cast listed alphabetically:
Viv Anderson	...	Himself
John Barnes	...	Himself
Peter Beardsley	...	Himself
Andreas Brehme	...	Himself
Terry Butcher	...	Himself
Emilio Butragueño	...	Himself
Kerry Dixon	...	Himself
Terry Fenwick	...	Himself
Paulo Futre	...	Himself
Andy Goram	...	Himself
Richard Gough	...	Himself
Mark Hateley	...	Himself
Glenn Hoddle	...	Himself
Lars Høgh	...	Himself

Storyline

The official documentary record of the 1986 soccer World Cup, highlighting the Captain of Argentina, Diego Maradona.

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Plot Keywords:

soccer | sweat | fight | endurance | referee | 

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Genres:

Documentary | Sport

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Details

Country:

UK

Language:

English

Release Date:

2 July 1987 (West Germany)

Also Known As:

Hero

Company Credits

Production Co:

Worldmark-Samuelson International Productions

Technical Specs

Runtime:

86 min

Color:

Color

Did You Know?

Connections

Follows G'olé! (1984)

User Reviews

An account of the 13th FIFA World Cup

This movie is a must for all people that enjoy soccer as an art. What strikes first about this movie about a soccer world cup is the way it is filmed. Besides following the play like a TV broadcast, there is generous footage dedicated to follow individual players in the games. This brings forward the emotions and situations these men go through as they attempt to reach glory. Today's TV broadcasting style, so different than that of 1986, is still inferior in quality compared to this movie.

The players are not the only stars. The audience, the referees, the journalists covering the matches and the environment itself all play a central role in the development of what today is history. In this movie you can see how all these factors play together in a very explicit way. In that regard, today's TV broadcasting style has not yet reached this level of quality, although it is now much closer than before.

There are several highlighted players: Maradona (Argentina), Elkjaer and Laudrup (Denmark), Francescoli (Uruguay), Platini (France), Lineker (England), Rummenigge (Germany), Butrague#o (Spain), Socrates (Brazil), and Sanchez (Mexico).

This movie is not a collection of the best soccer moves of Mexico 1986, although most of them are well covered. Across all the movie, there is a stress for presenting several aspects of the game and the competition itself based on the progress of these players and teams, even at the cost of skipping relevant plays of the games themselves. This is what makes this movie so interesting and unique.

Because of what happened because of referees during Mexico 1986, much of the comments about this movie and world cup are extremely Maradona-biased. Much of these comments do not take into account that there is a referee and two linesmen, that they are as human as the players, and that all of the abovementioned make mistakes one way or the other. Soccer rules do not allow referees to use TV based replays to make decisions, so for the most part referees have to decide on what they perceive. As a consequence, referees play an active part in the development of a game. Their influence can be seen in several parts of this movie.

The sequel movie for the 1990 World Cup, compared to this one, is just a source of bitter disappointment. Much of it comes from the fact that it became too involved in the game, whereas this movie tells things from a more distant, unbiased point of view.