“The world is much better when you win.”
Do you know this feeling when you think you are in law, but someone else’s point of view is ultimately more precise? It is not always a fun experience to admit when you are mistaken, especially when your pride embarrasses and drop others.
But what happens if your incorrect hypotheses dropped an entire nation in the process?
For Irish professional football player Roy Keane (Éanna Hardwicke) and manager Mick McCarthy (Steve Coogan), their real spit in 2002, weeks ahead of Ireland playing in the World Cup, is the legendary fabric. “Saipan”, directed by Glenn Leyburn and Lisa Barros of A SA and at first at the Toronto International Film Festival, details the so-called Saipan incident in which Roy and Mick do not agree on the preparations for the Irish football team leading to their very detecting in the World Cup. Roy leaves the team a few days before the World Cup accordingly, a decision that divides Ireland, some seeing it as a spoiled kid and others wanting him to continue to play.
Spoiler alert: Ireland does not do very well in the World Cup without Roy Keane.
“Saipan” does not introduce new information to its audience on a famous event that could have been avoided. Instead, the film provides a context in the two men at the center of the argument, leading to animated exchanges that could further complicate the question to be accomplished. It is left to the public to decide who is right and who is wrong, although the point of view of filmmakers is strongly suggested in favor of Roy.
The first 15 minutes of “Saipan” jump a little with rough down cuts surrounding Roy’s childhood dreams of becoming the greatest football player who has ever lived, to an early reality of the Aughts when the Irish football captain is very respected but somewhat after the British Rock Star player known as David Beckham. We are in 2002 after all, and the wild montages of popular play shows and the reputation of Ireland as a sporty laughter put the ground for a difficult battle. Sogpy and a little disorienting at the beginning, the style of staging of Leyburn and Barros of AA asks to get used to it.
To prepare the heat and humidity team that awaits them during the World Cup in Asia, Mick steals all his players to the island of Saipan in what is supposed to be several weeks of acclimatization, active training and alignment on the team’s goals. To the surprise and horror of Roy, however, the island’s training facilities are lower than the party and that the team is not equipped with football balls or other necessary equipment, although management does not seem too worried. Nothing to do all day but party and relax in the saunas, the rest of the players enjoy the calm before the World Cup storm.
Under conditions less than stellar and in the midst of growing disagreements between Roy and Mick on how to prepare their team for the fight for their professional life, the island becomes the framework of a verbal fight with direct elimination which leaves the world amazed before the first match is played.
“Saipan” is a reflection of the dynamics of power at a time when sports superstars represented the position of a country in the world. Their celebrity egos often take precedence over their wild ambitions. The film is mainly seen through the eyes of Roy, and the cinema team uses rapid and rapid changes to supervise Roy’s mindset when it turns into more anger and resentment to the lack of preparation of his colleagues.
While the weight of the country’s hopes and dreams rests on the shoulders of Roy and Mick, managing this pressure while maintaining their importance is a delicate balance that comes with its own set of complications.
Hardwicke and Coogan are extremely talented actors who give Roy and Mick respectively, a story to explore. For an American without any knowledge of this famous incident, “Saipan” opened my eyes to the affirmation between individuals and the disaster which consequently awaits the hierarchy of influence. The film provides enough context to wonder if Roy’s maniac behavior should have been tolerated or if Mick’s reluctance to lead could have changed the course of Ireland’s trajectory on the ground.
The film is at its most self-reprehensive (and often destructive) when the tension between the two men in the center of the premise is illustrated for the public as an almost boiling pot of water. “Do not prepare, then prepare to fail,” we read in a moment of newspaper, perfectly encapsulating a moment in the time when the ego and the sporting spirit collide in a non-natural way.
