In April 2001, the American Samoa soccer team took on Australia during a FIFA World Cup qualifying match at Coffs Harbour, NSW. They lost 31-nil.
A Dutch American coach was sent to try reverse the team's ignominious fortunes, and help them try to score their first goal.
Oscar-winning director Taika Waititi has helped immortalise that story in his latest film, Next Goal Wins.
But even though the film focuses on "the beautiful game", it is about so much more.
At the heart of the movie is a character based on Jaiyah Saelua, a striker on the American Samoa team (though not in the 2001 squad), who was the first openly trans athlete to compete in a FIFA World Cup qualifier match.
Fa'afafine in film
Based on a critically acclaimed documentary, Next Goal Wins has become a comedy-sports-drama film in the hands of Waititi.
Coach Thomas Rongen (Michael Fassbender) arrives on the island, to find a ragtag team, including Saelua.
Saelua, and the actress playing her, Kaimana, are both Fa'afafine. As explained in the films production notes, Fa'afafine and fa'afatama are fluid gender roles that move between male and female worlds, who are highly respected in society.
It's not easy for Saelua: she's deadnamed and misgendered by Rongen, and grapples with deciding whether or not to continue with hormone therapy.
But Saelua is embraced by her team, who support her for who she is.
Saelua told the ABC that Waititi's version of the story highlighted her journey more than the documentary.
"I thought it was one of the standout parts of this film… there was a really beautiful dive into the cultural significance of the Fa'afafine," she said.
"It's just a beautiful part of our culture that's specific to the Samoan people, but also to the region.
"And a lot of indigenous cultures around the world have somewhat of the same aspect, in regards to the respect for the identity and roles and responsibilities that are traditionally delegated for Fa'afafine and Fa'afatama."
Actor Kaimana met with Saelua for the film — the only actor among the cast to meet with their real-life counterpart.
"There wasn't a need to divorce myself between the real Jaiyah and the character in the film, because we are so similar," Kaimana said in the film's production notes.
"It was actually the tool that I used to guide me through it."
Saelua says there wasn't a lot of conversation about the team, or their huge loss, while she was growing up in American Samoa.
"When I was young, it was still a pretty new sport," she explained, saying she didn't actually hear about the 31-zero annihilation until she joined the national team.
"But seeing it now, first in the documentary, and then again in this movie, just seeing how we came from a really horrible loss and picked ourselves up and were able to develop into a team, was pretty eye opening."
A film about family
One big priority for Taika Waititi as a director was using local talent on set.
While shooting Thor: Love and Thunder in Sydney in 2021, Waititi hired young Indigenous interns to work in different departments, and noted that a lot of them are still working in the film industry today.
"There's a great deal of authenticity and inclusion there," he explained.
"My one thing is that we just can't get too comfortable and think that, 'Oh, we've fixed it', because the diversity issue is far from being fixed, and we still need to elevate and amplify native and minority voices."
Loading...He said he approached Next Goal Wins as a family project, given he knows many people in American Samoa, including the people who would become the crew. They all understood the story and what they were there for.
"The way that we've been portrayed — Pacific Islanders and native people in general — in films especially, is very different to this, and often very serious and nowhere near the most fun characters."
The film includes a cast of silly and sometimes hopeless characters, something that was very intentional.
"It was important to show that native people are very normal, and they make a lot of mistakes, and are far from perfect, and that, you know, we can be dorky and nerdy and clumsy, and not good at stuff," Waititi explained.
"And it was important that we were able to laugh at ourselves, too — make ourselves part of the joke. And the reason that we can get away with it is because it's told from [that] lens."
Be the underdog you want to see in the world
While the film is a true, feel-good, underdog story with layers of emotion and comedy, Taika says the message he wants the audience to take away afterward is a simple: "Be happy."
"So much of our lives are spent on work and obsessing about work and this idea of success. And that means nothing really — success — and equates to this idea of winning, which is something that's just drilled into us again and again," he said.
"The pressure to win in life is so great, now, none of us can really meet that standard.
"And so it's easier to just give up, be happy. And realise that concept of success and winning is actually false."
Next Goal Wins opens in Australian cinemas January 1.
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2023-12-27 22:24:23Z
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