In the world of sports cinema, few films manage to intertwine humor and depth as effectively as ‘Saipan’. This Irish soccer comedy not only entertains but also delves into profound themes of identity and ambition.
‘Saipan’ Review: Éanna Hardwicke Shines in This Smart Irish Soccer Comedy
There’s trouble in paradise in this surprisingly profound soccer comedy, which takes an episode from 2022 that passed most of the world by but left the Republic of Ireland in bits, so much so that it was even compared (elsewhere, obviously) to the death of Princess Diana. You may struggle to place Saipan — it’s the capital of the Northern Mariana Islands in the Western Pacific Ocean — or, more likely, recall what vital sporting event took place there.
Background of the Film
That’s because there wasn’t one: Saipan is where Ireland manager Mick McCarthy (played here by Steve Coogan) took his team to practice for a vital 2022 World Cup game in Japan, and then spectacularly fell out with his star player, who went home and took Ireland’s dreams of dominance with him. It seems an odd and incredibly specific moment to focus on, but directors Lisa Barros D’Sa and Glenn Leyburn have their reasons, as quickly becomes apparent in this smart and sometimes electrifying comedy-drama.
Directorial Style
The directing duo’s last film, Ordinary Love (2019), was a tender study of a middle-aged couple dealing with cancer, and, in a weird way, Saipan is its dark doppelganger. Where that film was a story of togetherness, Saipan is the opposite; two men struggling to find common ground in pursuit of the same end. At the same time, Saipan more strongly resembles the film they made before that. Ostensibly about the record label of the same name, Good Vibrations was a film about the extraordinary resilience of the Irish people and how the Belfast punk scene of the late ’70s played its part in the peace process.
Plot Overview
Though it technically begins in 2022, Saipan starts with a flashback in which a young Irish boy is kicking a ball about. This is the young Roy Keane (Éanna Hardwicke), and he is later to become Ireland’s manager and M.V.P.; but when we meet his adult self, he is one the benches, laid up with a leg injury and training furiously. Without him, the team plays in Tehran and, despite losing, somehow wins on points, sending them through to the World Cup. Keane’s physical readiness has the football world on tenterhooks, and his famously truculent personality has made him a media magnet. He is also already at loggerheads with McCarthy, only 12 years older than Keane but already a relic in the fast-moving world of soccer. However, McCarthy tolerates him, telling his wife, “What makes him a great player on the pitch makes him a pain in the ass off it.”
Setting the Scene
To prepare for Japan, McCarthy has booked the team into a hotel in Saipan, a faded wedding destination with next to no facilities, not even footballs at this early stage. For a time, Keane puts up with this, but not at all graciously, making his displeasure known while the rest of his team just go with the flow, partying when they should be training and living up to their country’s bad-boy image. Keane, though, sees nothing but disaster ahead, a portent presaged by some of the film’s most enduring images, like a stretch limo with a flat tire and a steam room littered with empty champagne bottles. In contrast, Keane’s mini bar is stocked with a healthy selection of smoothies and juices.
Character Dynamics
As he was back then, Keane is a contradictory but compelling figure (“Kamikaze Keane,” the papers call him), and Hardwicke completely nails him. Working both alongside and opposite that, Coogan gives a more subtle, more reactive performance than we’ve seen from him lately, doing his best scenes in silence; we see the cogs whirring in his mind as he tries desperately to come up with a strategy that will bring Keane onside. Even emotional blackmail doesn’t work. “The people of Ireland are depending on you,” says McCarthy. “I didn’t ask for that,” says Keane. And this, in a nutshell, is the engine of the movie.
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Thematic Depth
With incredible economy, the directors use it to dive headfirst into issues of national identity, deftly sketching in one of the main reasons for Keane’s unhappiness: as an Irishman, he feels patronized and marginalized enough, but as an Irish footballer he feels like something of a dancing bear, and the archive clips from the time show that he wasn’t wrong at all to think that. It all comes out in a spectacular showdown in the hotel’s tatty ballroom, where, in disgrace after giving a loose-lipped interview with the press, Keane tells McCarthy how he really feels, a sudden escalation that’s shocking both in its honesty and its vitriol.
Conclusion
For those unfamiliar with the sport, rest easy — there are only occasional references to the business of soccer (for instance, former Manchester United manager Alex Ferguson) — but Saipan is not a sports film in the usual sense, although it could be described as a battle of wills. Key to its much broader appeal is relative newcomer Hardwicke, who is simply incredible and more than holds his own against Coogan. Because of him, we feel nothing but sympathy for the self-sabotaging sportsman, and even though he clearly is the author of his own disastrous destiny, Keane nevertheless emerges from the wreckage as a hero.
Title: Saipan
Festival: Toronto (Centerpiece)
Directors: Lisa Barros D’Sa, Glenn Leyburn
Screenwriter: Paul Fraser
Cast: Steve Coogan, Éanna Hardwicke
Sales agent: Bankside
Running time: 1 hr 31 mins
