Quartile rating: 6.5/10 · 1 rating
Take the Ball, Pass the Ball is the definitive story of the greatest football team ever assembled. For four explosive years, Pep Guardiola's Barça produced the greatest football in history, seducing fans around the world. In this exclusive, first-hand account of events between 2008 and 2012, the players themselves reveal the tension of the bitter Guardiola-Mourinho rivalry, the emotion of Abidal's fight back from cancer to lift the European Cup and how Messi, the best footballer the world's ever seen, was almost rejected by Barça as a 13-year-old.
A well-crafted football documentary with excellent first-hand player testimonies and intimate access to one of the greatest teams in sports history. The subject matter — Guardiola's Barça dynasty — is genuinely compelling and the film benefits from remarkable archive footage and candid interviews. However, it follows a fairly conventional 'glory days retrospective' documentary structure, and cinematography is limited by standard talking-head and archival formats. Acting is not applicable in the traditional sense but the interview subjects are articulate and engaging. Novelty is moderate — the subject is iconic but the storytelling approach is fairly orthodox for a sports documentary. A solid, above-average entry in sports filmmaking without breaking new ground formally.