There is a terrific documentary to be made about Lionel Messi and his decision to finish his career playing in a backwater football league in the United States. Let’s just say Messi Meets America (Apple TV+) isn’t it.
Actually, this is not a documentary at all. Rather it is an extended commercial for Major League Soccer, of which, by absolutely no coincidence at all, Apple TV is the principal broadcaster. All slo-mo clips of our hero sashaying across a football pitch, a cut-and-paste of over-excited fans and commentators shouting how Messi is “the world’s number 10”, this is a lengthy insistence that, now the man himself is there, the MLS is the place to be; these are the games to watch, preferably via an Apple TV subscription.
If you are looking for insight, for revelation, even for the occasional glimpse of what our hero is like away from the game, then the first episode suggests you are wasting your time. Indeed we hear far more from David Beckham, who engineered Messi’s signing for his Florida start-up and has just produced his own Netflix documentary almost as unrevealing as this, than we do from the man himself.
Which is not to say there is nothing interesting in all this flurry of salesmanship. Beckham has long recognised the financial value of celebrity. And it is clear from this documentary that he recognises the best way to sell Inter Miami in the American market is through the lens of fame. Bringing the world’s most illustrious, decorated and marketable player to his football club, he acknowledges, is the quickest way to put it on the map. Though he doesn’t quite state it like that. According to him, he persuaded Messi to head west for more elevated reasons. “We did it for America,” he purrs, apparently with all seriousness.
2023-10-11 01:00:00
#Messi #Meets #America #review #glorified #advert #Major #League #Soccer #David #Beckham
