The original post: /r/movies by /u/ApricotJellyzz on 2025-01-01 09:54:30.
This movie is about different characters and survivor bias. It’s a movie about the importance of community in day to day lives along with emphasis of the transient and the absurd nature of life. This movie really moved me seeing the main protagonist’s journey and the wonderful people that he comes across. This movie also presents other characters with their flaws and obligations, but the solidarity of them all when it comes to the beautiful game.
This movie follows a character of a man, who is passionate about football, who is good at football. He is reluctantly recruited to represent England’s team, he is, at this point, is characteristic of pride and a sense of entitlement. He is homeless but his situation is unacceptable even for him, telling himself that he is more than his disposition. This attitude is also present even in his interaction with his team mates. His team mates are of low calibre compared to him, but win him over in the end, because of their love, despite their rough backgrounds. All the team mates are not from England but represent England show that its not about patriotism but solidarity irrespective of one’s race. In the end we also get to know the reality behind the hero’s spiteful behaviour: he has not had his dream realized. He is deserving of more, but he was not enough and this feeling taunts him, everywhere he goes. This tournament consists of losers who don’t make it, but it’s not tragic since they all come together in spite of their own differences for the love of this beautiful game, and have this sense of community and emphasise that ultimately this is what matters.
In this world they are two types of people: who had their dreams realized and the ones who haven’t. There is this thing called survivor bias: we see only the ones who have their dreams realized. We see this all fields: sports, science, business, careers. What about the people who also had this dream? They too have feelings, they are also human, are they are not carved in god’s image? Many people who have failed and failed, who were not enough, were the product of circumstances. This fact of life, gives me an appreciation for all the people who have their current jobs and love them for who they are. Imagine a person who has spent all their life, working on their dreams, sacrificing everything in their life, only to realise that ultimately it is the matter of chance and circumstance. I love the character Nathan, his innocence after all that he has been through pierces my heart. Despite all that he has been through, he does not show one ounce of pride or ego, his child like innocence along with his tragic fate really moved me. It re-enforced me to have an open mind and show kindness to people, since they too have their own back stories and one should respect them, and a guy like him should not deserve the treatment that he received. Evening during the end, the unconditional love that they show for the hero, is admirable even though after everything the team mates have to put up with, and that is the point; the sense of community and love whether you make it or not, is what in life matters at the end. Rest everything is all chance. Our hero in the end is struck with the same realization.
This movie re-enforced by belief that: many prayers go unanswered. Life is too fleeting and absurd to have your identity entangled with it, therefore it is better to live for the present and just choose the best choice that I can. Unlike my privileged situation where survival is not at stake this mindset is difficult to put this into action, because the worse off you are in life, you are more inclined to hope but not everyone will have their dreams realized. Solidarity and community are something is that can be valued since it only requires the present moment’s attention which is transient. But again, this depends on person to person, what they choose as their things to value.