Why 'Mike Bassett: England Manager' (2001) is the best Film about Football

Mike Bassett: England Manager 

Director: Steve Barron

Stars: Ricky Tomlinson, Amanda Redman, Bradley Walsh

In 2001, a comedy about English national football was made that is now sadly overlooked. Many of the greatest British comedies have shown us how to laugh at ourselves – Steve Barron’s mockumentary is no exception. Ricky Tomlinson plays Mike Bassett, the last resort choice to lead a dishevelled England squad towards World Cup glory. As predicted, the team fail to deliver the goods, ensuring Bassett is greeted with a tirade of abuse from home supporters.

Tomlinson’s Bassett and his right hand man “Dave Dodds” (played by Walsh) are English football fans’ worst fears realised through their hilarious ineptitude. Basset’s blind optimism is made evident by a series of awful decisions: his star player has a drinking problem, his assistant manager is merely a used car salesman and his center back is more violent than Charles Bronson. Being thirteen years old, the film’s characters clearly show echoes of Gascoigne, Beckham and Vinnie Jones; yet it is no real stretch to draw comparisons to the recent woeful efforts Roy Hodgson’s England squad. Fortunately for Roy, he wasn’t greeted with tabloid headlines such as “W****r”, nor did his family suffer personal torment from disgruntled football fans. Blundering aside, it is hard not to feel sympathetic for Bassett, particularly when people start egging his house. Tomlinson’s superb performance ensures that Mike Bassett is a man that you would love to have a drink with, not simply because he can put away his Sambuca shots. The scene where the inebriated manager dances half-naked on top of a hotel bar in Rio is one of the many perfect instances of crassness yet humility that other nations across the world have come to expect from us English folk. Not only is this film a humorous and somewhat honest portrayal of English football, it is also a great reminder of English national identity. This may not be a welcome observation for some, but these are people that have clearly never been on a club 18-30 holiday.

   The emotional finale serves to create a powerful sense of pathos amongst the hilarity and disorder – a balance rarely achieved without an unpleasant aftertaste of schmaltziness. Despite the film’s fairly conservative running time, it is easy to get swept up in the enthralling narrative and colourful characters that Steve Barron captures. So in a couple of years when you’re down the pub shouting obscenities at the TV screen because our team are three-nil down against Poland at the Euro’s, spare a though for Mike Bassett and remember that these people are only human beings. Insanely overpaid... but human beings nonetheless. 

RATING: 5/5