Goal is a three-hour-long sports
movie. It has everything – loads of
Indianism, a lip-lock, an item number,
an over-hyper Sikh gentleman, a
has-been coach with a stubble (like
always), a couple of emotional players
who break down and cry at the
slightest provocation, a captain with
a foul mouth but a heart of gold, a
player with a quick foot and high
aspirations, and finally, football.
Arshad Warsi (the only watchable actor
in the movie) is a captain of a
football club in Southhall with the
same name, and also a restaurateur.
The lease of the club is running out,
and he needs three million pounds to
save the club. Coincidentally, there
is a club championship, with this
exact number of pounds as the prize
money. We are only introduced to three
of his teammates – a Sikh gentleman
who runs a garage, a butcher’s son,
and a stubby Bangladeshi with dark
skin and long hair. The rest of the
team stays anonymous throughout the
movie.
John Abraham is a rising star on the
football horizon who plays for a
gora team. He wears body-hugging
T-shirts, gets his nose broken, and
squints throughout the movie. He is
British born, and apparently the best
they have, but he is discriminated
because of his color. (Will somebody
tell the director that Britain today
bends over backwards to assimilate
other cultures and immigrants,
especially in the sports field?) To go
on, our hero must join hands with
Southhall to teach the goras a
lesson.
Boman Irani is the
washed-out player who must coach the
Southhall team, since they are so
pathetic and need a kick in the butt
to perform better. He sports stubble,
wears a golf-cap sideways, and hams.
Bipasha Basu is Warsi’s sister, and
the team’s physiotherapist, but we
don’t see her doing much, except
looking pretty, tending John’s nose,
and giving a half-hearted massage to
an injured player.
Raj Jutshi is the
Sardarji with a nagging wife who he
calls lado, runs a garage, and cracks
silly jokes when they are not
necessary. Apart from this, we don’t
know what he is doing in a football
team, since he starts panting every
time he starts running.
I won’t say
that this is a bad movie. But after
watching three hours of bad acting,
bad direction, bad editing, and
inexplicably long scenes, what would
you say? This could have been a much
better movie, if director Vivek
Agnihotri (who directed Chocolate, a
direct copy of The Usual Suspects) had
given more meat to the characters. We
just see one side of the characters,
and too few of them anyway and you
start wondering what is the point of
having the other characters if they
are not introduced to us.
Otherwise too, the movie has many
flaws. The coach takes the team to the
Manchester United grounds, where he
mysteriously gains entry into the
locker rooms, and blurts out an
unbearably long, emotionally charged
set of dialogues. And of course, the
grounds are unmanned, and there is not
a soul to keep an eye on them. Isn’t
ManU supposed to be the Mecca of
British Football?
Then there is this big double-decker
bus, which is the team vehicle
–totally battered and needs a push
every time it needs to run.
Surprisingly, it has plush seats
inside, with polished chrome interiors
and so on.
Then there is the annoying Dilip Tahil
as the football commentator (!!) who
breaks into a smattering of Punjabi on
TV, every time he is surprised or
excited. He also doubles as the
villains sidekick, but is not menacing
enough.
So, after sitting through the
three-hour movie, I can safely say
that the only thing to watch in the
movie is the title song, which is
smartly shot and edited (and hummable
too), and the final, fifteen minute
climax. Wait for the DVD to come out,
and watch these chapters selectively.
You can fast-forward through rest of
the movie.
‘nuff said.
