Rohitavra Majumdar

Has there been a better fairytale story than Leicester City's 2016 Premier League triumph in modern day football history? The clear answer here is “absolutely not”. And without the iconic rags to riches story of Jamie Vardy, it wouldn't have happened. The first chapter of Netflix's “Untold UK,” a three-part documentary series, puts the focus on Vardy's story and shows us the journey. The treatment is nothing new and it follows the set template of sports documentaries, but Vardy's story is so miraculous that you still enjoy watching it, or at least I did, as a football fan. If you're a non-football person then this might be quite a hard watch for you, but I also see no reason for you to even tune in. In this article, I'm gonna do a bit of introspection, while discussing “Untold: Jamie Vardy.”

Football is the greatest sport in the world, and France is beautiful, but in the year 2010, French football had to suffer one of the ugliest scandals in the history of the sport. What's even worse? The whole thing taking place during the football World Cup, known as the greatest show on earth to many. “The Bus: A French Football Mutiny” puts that event in the spotlight, and makes a pretty exciting documentary out of it. The reason it mainly works is because all the people associated with the matter are chipping in and going full introspection-mode, except Nicolas Anelka, of course. I'm kinda surprised that Netflix couldn't manage to convince him to be a part of the documentary. Anyway, it is what it is, and in this article we're gonna discuss what we saw in the documentary and put some light on both the what and why.

How much cheese is too much cheese? The right answer is “it's never too much”! That's certainly the case with Netflix's South-African rom-com “Bride of the Year,” it's exactly the kind of escapist cinema you seek out at times, and it only works for you if you have an extra sweet tooth. You're here after watching the movie, and I don't see any reason for you to really be confused over “Bride of the Year,” but if you have missed something, then this article ought to help.

What's the greatest football match of all time, and why is it the 2005 Uefa Champions League final? I mean, up until the 2022 Fifa World Cup final happened, that was the undisputed winner, and even now, the UCL final, between AC Milan and Liverpool, edges past for many, making the statement valid enough. Netflix's “Untold UK: Liverpool's Miracle of Istanbul” puts the spotlight on that game, obviously from Liverpool's POV, and traces the backstory behind it. Players Jamie Carragher, Steven Gerrard, Jerzy Dudek, Dietmar Hamann, and manager Rafael Benitez all appear as narrators, with names like Michael Owen and Xabi Alonso also chipping in. Instead of footballing tactics and technicalities, the documentary focuses mainly on what was going on inside the heads of the players (and their manager), which, in my humble opinion, makes it an exciting watch, overall.

After exploring Jamie Vardy 's incredible rags to riches story and Liverpool's 2005 Champions League miracle, “Untold UK” is back for its final

If there's one man all the Argentine supporters, including myself, should forever stay indebted to, it has to be Emiliano “Dibu” Martinez. I mean, there's no way I'm trying to take anything away from a certain someone called Leo Messi, but what Dibu Martinez did in the 123rd minute of the 2022 World Cup final is the sole reason the past four years have gone so well for us. Even Messi's reaction at that very moment clearly shows how important “that save” was – you can always go and check out the thousands of available videos to understand exactly what I'm talking about. Getting to write about a Dibu Martinez documentary produced by Netflix was always gonna be a fun assignment for me, and I'm glad that it's finally happening. “Emi Martinez: The Kid Who Stops Time” is no ordinary documentary though. Sure, it does follow the set template, but it also peppers the whole thing with this animated short film. The end result is a documentary which almost feels like you're watching a wholesome rom com; yes, Emi's romance with his wife, Mandinha, gets a lot of focus as well. Let's take a closer look.

Early on in the Netflix documentary “Poldi,” the subject, star footballer Lukas Podolski, is told most sports documentaries are eighty percent about the athlete and their achievements, and the remaining twenty percent is about the other things – family, friends etc. Podolski makes it very clear he wants to flip that around for good. Everyone already knows what he has achieved; just to put things in perspective, the man is a World Cup winner with Germany, and the fourth most capped player in the country's football history. But “Poldi,” as a documentary, does its best to stay away from all of that and focus on the man instead, and it mostly succeeds. Of course, it's impossible to ignore football when you're talking about someone like Podolski, but the sport remains a way of life in this doc, rather than a path to glory. Let us take a closer look.

Let me start by saying this, for the sake of a bit of context. I come from a country where a child sleeping with their parents, or a fun uncle or aunt of the opposite sex, used to be normalized, at least back in the nineties. Of course, the reason I'm bringing this up is Netflix's latest three-part docu series, “Michael Jackson: The Verdict,” which focuses entirely on the infamous trial of the King of Pop, back in 2005. There shouldn't be any doubt that Jackson remains a pop-culture icon forever; the very recent biographical movie, “Michael,” has testified to that. But this documentary series doesn't get into that at all. Its only concern is whether Jackson did the wrong thing or not. Well, Jackson himself admitted that he slept with all those boys at his house, the Neverland Ranch, in the same bed. But the key part here is that, according to Jackson, it was non-sexual. There's no denying that in the world and society we live in, the term “sleeping with” automatically implies physical intimacy. Naturally, a grown man sleeping with a twelve or thirteen year old is seen as quite a sin, in that context. This docuseries hinges very much on that, in a very typical, flashy manner like most Netflix docs do.

The term “dark horse” is possibly one of the most romantic in sports, of any kind; there's a special kind of joy in witnessing someone (or collectively a team) other than the obvious contenders emerging victorious out of nowhere. With the greatest show on Earth, i.e., the Fifa World Cup, at our doorstep again, certain nations beyond the usual Argentina, Brazil, Germany, Spain, etc. are getting attention as potential dark horses, all thanks to their recent form, and how they've made it through the qualifiers – make no mistake, that's no easy thing, I'm sure the Italian football supporters can testify! Among the dark horses this year, the Norwegian football team has to be the most talked about, deservingly so, given how they've won all of their play-offs matches, including beating four-time world champions, Italy, twice. What makes it more special is the fact that this is their first appearance at this stage after twenty eight years. That's enough reason to justify a docuseries, but “Norway: The Dark Horse” further justifies it by being one of the best bits of football content Netflix has churned out recently.

The joke must be on you if you've tried making sense out of “Citizen Vigilante,” given it is a film directed by none other than Uwe Boll. The German director is notorious for making some of the worst films in the history of modern day cinema, and has even won awards for bad filmmaking – yes, something called the “Golden Raspberry” exists, Google it to know further. So like all Boll films, “Citizen Vigilante” is no different, and also very no nonsense – it indeed is about a citizen who turns into a vigilante. A washed up, visibly disinterested Armie Hammer plays the part, and it looks like the actor saved some of the worst acting of his career for this Boll masterpiece. That's a really sad turnaround for someone who used to be Hollywood's hot property only some years ago, but anyway, let's discuss “Citizen Vigilante,” because that's what you're here for.