Search for a film:

 

November 30, 2007

Zidane: A 21st Century Portrait

Portraiture at 24fps

By Ben

Playing on a Real Madrid team that included David Beckham and Ronaldo, Zinedine Zidane obviously wasn't chosen as the subject of Douglas Gordon and Philippe Parreno's feature length experimental film, Zidane: A 21st Century Portrait, for his good looks, or his goal scoring prowess. However, Zidane is a soccer legend and for every moment in his career where he lost his temper and did something stupid like headbutting someone, he created many more moments that demonstrated why soccer is known by so many as "the beautiful game." Whereas players like Beckham have very public lives off the field, Zidane's public persona exists for ninety minutes at a time. So instead of making a typical documentary exploring the life of their subject, the filmmakers chose to create their "21st century portrait" by following Zidane on the field during a real game for ninety minutes and nothing more.

With cinematographer Darius Khondji (Delicatessan, Se7en, My Blueberry Nights) heading a group of seventeen cameras operated by some of the best camera operators in the world, the film is absolutely gorgeous to look at. It's a mish mash of different looks, feels, and textures thanks to the use of footage culled from various sources and cameras. HD video, 35mm film, and plain old video are edited together and we're presented with a minute by minute, second by second account of one man playing a game of soccer.

One could say that Zidane is a documentary entry into the genre that I like to call the "cinema of verisimilitude." A genre in which the sole purpose of the film seems to be faithfully recreating a real life incident. The two other films that immediately come to mind are Paul Greengrass' United 93 and Ridley Scott's Blackhawk Down, big budget relatives of historical docudramas you find on channels like A&E. These films generally are not meant to be entertaining but to somehow serve as a monument to the people that were involved in the events portrayed.

Zidane is a monument to one of soccer's living legends. You rarely see the ball throughout the film. Instead, the camera is almost entirely focused on him as he trots around the field. It's actually pretty shocking how little he touches the ball and in the rare moments he does, he gets rid of it so quickly that if you're not careful you could miss it. Nevertheless, the film feels epic. Whereas portrait artists of the past who painted their pictures were only able to catch one expression or pose, the filmmakers were able to capture twenty-four per second for ninety minutes. The narrative of the film plays out across Zidane's face and oh what a face it is.

Rarely smiling, Zinedine Zidane is the personification of intense concentration. Running back and forth across the pitch and accompanied by a soundtrack written by Mogwai, the filmmakers appear to be attempting to elevate Zidane to demigod status as he performs his sisyphean task. However, at half time, footage of random events taking place around the world remind us that it's just a game and that during those ninety minutes plenty of other things are happening. Zidane himself seems to know this too. After a moment of individual brilliance in which he sets up a goal for his team he begins to relax and we see him smile a handful of times. Late in the game when he loses his temper and gets kicked out of the game after a red card it's confirmed that he is human after all.

During a couple moments in the film, excerpts from interviews with Zidane are printed along the bottom of the screen. Toward the end of the film one of the quotes reads, "magic is sometimes very close to nothing at all." This was most fitting because in a game of soccer there often appears to be very little happening when in reality there's so much going on. The same could be said of Zidane's performance or this film in general. This is a film that can be enjoyed as a soccer documentary, an experiment, a brilliant technical achievement, or as a portrait that reveals much about an enigmatic figure while revealing very little at the same time.

Back to Top