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THE OTHER FIELDS

by Marco Kugel, Simon Quack

synopsis

Every summer, when the major football teams fly their star athletes to training grounds in expensive and sunny locations, some other players meet on a football field in Duisburg. Even though there are professional footballers, they are all unemployed. And they look desperately for a job. The Other Fields sheds a new and completely different light on the mythologies of contemporary football. While some may think that “bling-bling” and “glitz” is all there is to modern football, Marco Kugel’s and Simon Quack’s film shows the intricate economic and moral complexities behind the façade of entertainment. Dreams only last a season or two. An athlete is only as good as his performance. The achievement-oriented society does not allow too many dreams (or dreamers…) even though it is exactly dreams that are sold to audiences everywhere. Footballers looking for a breakthrough but living constantly on the verge of failure are exchanged at a fast rate. The Other Fields shows how the entertainment and sports system fits and basically is just another cog of the capitalistic production system.

international title: The Other Fields
original title: Die Anderen Plätze
country: Germany
year: 2017
genre: documentary
directed by: Marco Kugel, Simon Quack
film run: 84'
producer: Nico Hain
production: Sein+Hain Film

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