Last night’s premiere of Win!, a new documentary about New York City FC, proved a first for an MLS team. With the movie screening at the Robert De Niro-founded Tribeca Film Festival in New York City the evening marked the first time a league team featured in a full-length work at a mainstream film festival. And to celebrate the occasion, naturally, major team figures like David Villa, Mix Diskerud, and sporting director Claudio Reyna turned up to take it all in.
These latter three fan favorites, naturally, also appear as stars of the film. But not only the biggest marquee names appear in the story (though yes, Frank Lampard and Andrea Pirlo show up too). Instead, this is a nearly two-hour, fly-on-the wall, super-intimate look at the nuts and bolts of first building the team, then fielding it the first year. It’s almost as much the story of the likes of Kwadwo Poku and Patrick Mullins and supporters as it is of the towering Designated Players.
You can read our interview with Win! director Justin Webster here, from before the premiere of the movie. Now, with the work out there—there are four more screenings you can catch at Tribeca, click here for details—here are some quick major impressions after first viewing.
Claudio Reyna’s story—as well as his relationship with his father—both hits the good emotional buttons and provides some nifty exposition for the film.
As director Webster told us in our previous interview with him, the film is intended both as insight into the building of a team, but also of tracing that building as parallel to the rise of soccer in the U.S. mainstream. Rather than getting heavy-handed about the history of the game, Webster manages a nifty trick early in the movie, when Claudio Reyna visits his parents.
First, you get the warm fuzzies from his interaction with his Argentine father, who introduced him to the game, and who keeps a basement full of Claudio- and Argentina-specific soccer memorabilia. The elder Reyna, Miguel, waxes proud: “That’s everyone’s dream—to imagine that one day your son will play in a World Cup.” He, however, also quickly in a conversation, recaps the contemporary history of the sport in New York City, starting with the Generals and bringing us up to the present day.
Win! demystifies—to a certain extent—some of the drafting and scouting process.
Hardcore MLS fans will delight in watching both sporting staff and front office types debate in conference rooms over things like salary caps, league structure, and how to best work the expansion draft and transfer windows.
As part of that, there’s a scene in which now-former NYCFC head coach Jason Kreis calls now-former NYFC defender Chris Wingert. There’s some talk over how Wingert may have wanted to go to Toronto FC. That conversation also makes it sound like at one point around 2014, Kreis was trying to sign Nat Borchers, too.
Also, interestingly, every time a new player appears as a character on screen, text showing his club or college history, along with his salary, pops up.
There’s a lot of Chris Wingert and Ned Grabavoy in there.
Chris Wingert is set up early in the film as a major-ish character, starting when now-former head coach Jason Kreis makes a call during the expansion draft to try to convince him to come to the team. Ned Grabavoy and his family get a fair share of air time too. Obviously, by the time the movie came out, they were long gone from the NYCFC picture, along with Kreis.
Oh well; that’s sports. As comfort for NYCFC fans, though, Poku’s journey to fan favorite winds up in there, too. (We also find out a legit place he likes to get West African food in New York City: Papaye Restaurant in the Bronx.)
The film originally had a different ending planned.
As Win! starts out, it seems, at first, like the usual narrative arc will take the characters through to a triumphant first entry onto the pitch, then leave. But Webster keeps the tension going beyond the team’s first game ever (an away match, against Orlando City) and first home match, and follows them through the rest of the season. The story stays unflinching when things get bleak and when Villa, the team captain, winds up apologizing to fans after the team’s last home game of the season.
But that wasn’t part of the original plan, Webster said in a post-screening Q&A. Around the first games, he said, he decided to keep it going—and “the film is much better for it,” he said.
The movie also presents a nice love letter to NYCFC fans.
There are beautiful, sweeping shots of a packed Yankee Stadium. There are throngs of passionate fans and marches to the match. There’s a particularly great sequence involving super-fan Andy Bajana Zuluaga, who steals the show by introducing himself to players as “the president of the Bronx” at a merch-signing event. There’s that aforementioned, impassioned speech by Villa. It all just underscores the fact that a team can’t, you know, exist without the fans.
(Before you break out your pitchforks, NYCFC haters, though, the overall message is that supporters are super-important in soccer culture. Various characters say as much, and that’s something you can take to heart for your own club, too.)
David Villa drops his most public facade, and shows how much he's truly playing for the fans.
If Villa’s seemed reserved at some of his earliest public outings for NYCFC, it can be explained largely by the language barrier. In fact, that provides some comic relief in Win! early on. “Imagine how boring meetings are in your own language,” he explains to a Spanish-speaking compatriot of the club’s early days. “Now imagine how I feel sitting there.”
Webster and his crew filmed over the course of two years, though, and by the end, most of the players and managerial types have clearly kind of forgotten the cameras are there. We hear snippets of off-the cuff conversation and see people curse in the locker room.
Villa himself, though, comes off as an unwavering democratic figure, hanging out in ice baths with even the lowest-ranking teammates, gamely conversing as best he can, and offering leadership and advice in the locker room. He’s also clearly playing for the people in the stadium seats. After the team’s home opener, he rushes through an ESPN sideline interview, telling the reporter, “Let me celebrate with the fans,” and walking, clapping towards the stands. If there’s one inarguable takeaway from the movie, it’s that Villa’s dedication is true.
