Bottoms Up! Pouring the right beer for each feature at the Kicking and Screening Film Festival

Editor's Note: We were asked to contribute a column to the Kicking and Screening Soccer Film Festival a few weeks back. The festival, which runs from July 20 to 23 at the Tribeca Theater in New York City, features some of the most interesting soccer films from around the globe. If you're in and around the NYC-area don't hesitate to get tickets to this great event.

Our assignment was to pick a beer that best represented each of the night's feature films. Here's what we came up with.

Bottoms up!

Each film in this year’s Kicking + Screening Soccer Film Festival (presented by the New York Red Bulls) takes a passionate, determined, intimate, celebratory, and sometimes sad look at the global game; feelings and emotions as diverse as the sport itself.

And just as the sights and sounds of cinema perfectly capture the culture of soccer, there is one, even more essential and enduring symbol of the game: beer, or course.

Millions around the planet see that beer and soccer go hand in hand (or mouth, really). At the pub, beer is sipped in anxiety. At the stadium, beer is thrown in ecstasy when the home team scores. At the park, after a pick-up game, beer is the elixir for sore muscles and the serum for unleashing tall tales of glory on the field.

And so when you settle in your seat at the Tribeca Cinemas for K+S in July, it is only appropriate that you have a beer in hand that complements each feature film. Here are my choices:

Argentina Fútbol Club, Wednesday, July 20

This film, which documents Argentina’s most intense rivalry, theSuperclasico between River Plate and Boca Juniors, “provides an intimate look at the cultural impact of this rivalry for the players who compete in it, the fans who cheer it on, and, ultimately, the country that lives for it.”

As passionate and divisive as the rivalry Boca and River may be, fans of both teams can agree on one thing: La Cerveza Quilmes. It is somewhat of a national symbol in Argentina, accounting for more than 75% of all beer sold in the country. It sponsors the national team, and has La Albiceleste’s colors to boot. Whether the Superclasico is played in River’s El Monumental (the world’s largest stadium) or Boca’s La Bombonera Quilmes is sure to be flowing from the stands.

Rise & Shine: The Jay DeMerit Story, Thursday, July 21

This film is sure to inspire, capturing the path of US national team defender DeMerit’s unlikely journey from Green Bay, Wisconsin, to the cathedrals of English soccer in the Premier League.

The former collegiate standout went to Europe with little money and a big dream, and his rise through from the lower divisions in England to captaining Watford in the world’s top league and playing for the United States in the 2010 World Cup is as uplifting as any story in soccer.

We honor Jay with a beer from his home state: Wisconsin’s New Glarus Brewing Co.'s Spotted Cow. Just like DeMerit, the Spotted Cow is a rare specimen. They are only available in Wisconsin and thus incredibly prized outside of it. From its humble origins in rural Wisconsin, New Glarus is now one of the state and nation’s most recognized craft breweries. Sounds like a story to which Jay could relate.

Soka Afrika, Friday, July 22

Friday night brings festival-goers the tale of two promising African footballers and their dreams of playing on the European stage. “Soka Afrika” follows a South African and a Cameroonian with very different tales of chasing stardom in Europe’s top leagues. For many young, promising players around the globe escaping the poverty and struggles of daily life through soccer is a dangerous journey.  Few players emerge from this struggle and many are swallowed whole.

For this film we’ve chosen probably the most obscure beer ever:Solibra Bock, made in Cote d’Ivoire.

Here’s the story: In 2006, when Cote d’Ivoire celebrated qualification for their first ever World Cup, champagne celebrations ensued. Chelsea superstar Didier Drogba, however, declined the bubbly in favor of a liter of Solibra Bock, a.k.a. "the beer for the strong man."

Drogba, of course, made the journey from West Africa to France to England, and his story is celebrated all across the African continent. And so in honor of a film that follows young Africans trying to follow in his footsteps, it seems fitting to go with the beer that is now commonly ordered from the bar as “a Drogba.”

Match 64, Saturday, July 23

K+S’s closer fittingly follows the sights and sounds of the 2010 FIFA World Cup’s final match. The film’s director, Daniel Gordon, does it more justice that we ever could:

Match 64 carries fans deeper into the heart of a World Cup final than they have ever gone before. From sunrise to sunset and beyond, Match 64 follows not only the two finalists and the match officials, but also local organizers and FIFA officials, born-and-bred Sowetans and VIPs. What emerges is an intimate portrait of a country that is coming of age in this post-apartheid era and whose stadium acts as a crucible of passion on a momentous occasion.

To celebrate a finals match we chose a beer named for a championship team, a local beer, New York’s own Brooklyn Brewery’s Pennant Ale ’55. Even though it honors a baseball “world champion,” it seems fitting that this English-style Pale Ale be shared while taking in this film that goes behind-the-scenes of a true world championship.

So there you have it… the diverse and, sometimes downright quirky, beer guide to the 2011 Kicking + Screening Soccer Film Festival.

Cheers!

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