The rise and fall of the Von Erich family, a dynasty of wrestlers who made a huge impact on the sport from the 1960s to the present day.
The Von Erichs (real name Adkisson) began their wrestling dynasty when Fritz Von Erich (born Jack Barton Adkisson) became a star in the National Wrestling Alliance, holding multiple belts in the 1960s before becoming president of the organisation. He died in 1997.
He and his wife Doris had six sons, five of whom died before their father, which led to talk of a curse, colloquially dubbed the ‘Von Erich curse’. Today, two sons of Kevin Von Erich, the last surviving brother, are both pro wrestlers with Major League Wrestling.
In 2009, the Von Erich family were inducted by Michael “P.S.” Hayes into the WWE Hall of Fame.
Derry, 1984. In a city divided by violence and trauma, Derry City football team had been exiled from the national league for 13 years. When four ex-footballers realised their city had lost its joy, they set out to achieve the impossible in persuading the Republic of Ireland to allow them to play across the border – becoming the first team in the world to play in another country’s league. This is the story of how they did it and the extraordinary seasons that followed. It transformed how the world saw Derry and how the city saw itself.
When the wife of Arsenal striker Brian Johnson died in childbirth, Johnson was at the top of his game with the world at his feet. Now, 30 years on, penniless, jobless and living on benefits, he manages the worst Sunday football team ever – the hapless Deportivo Wanka Football Club.
And with a new record five-year losing streak, and no sign of a goal in the last 43 matches, they occupy the unenviable position at the bottom of all of Hackney’s ten leagues and if they end up last again, they’ll be removed from the league forever.
It doesn’t help that the line-up of players include; his estranged son David who had trials with Arsenal but never showed up; Deano the goal keeper with a prosthetic hand and a fear of diving; Pingu, a brilliant but narcoleptic dwarf midfielder and a further assortment of violent, stupid and overweight underachievers more interested in the half-time burger van than scoring a goal.
So when Brian’s life catches up with him in the form of a pitch-side heart attack, he’s brought before a football mad Almighty super-keen on meeting every passing ex-pro and coaching a football team to victory for one game (preferably Manchester United).
Realising that he must do something to right his wrongs, Brian exploits God’s obsession with the beautiful game and makes a deal; he’ll put his soul on the line if God will accompany him back to earth and help coach the team to safety and give Brian one last chance to be a proper Dad to David.
God agrees but there is one immutable rule; If Brian succeeds, he’ll pick up where he left off, but if he fails, his soul goes straight to Lucifer and damnation, the universal law and the price of a second chance.
So Brian and God return to Earth and secure the victory extending Brian's life, but on the cusp of returning to Heaven, God learns that Lucifer has not only taken the vacant managerial position of Deportivos bitterest rivals, Salem FC but also talked Brian into signing over his soul.
God, now feeling guilty for having served up Brian on a plate to the Devil, returns to Earth in recompense to help Brian undo his pact with Lucifer. However Lucifer double crosses the Lord into raising the stakes – and God ends up gambling on not just saving Brian’s soul but the souls of the entire world all on the outcome of one football match.
Now all that stands between Brian and redemption is the Devil. And all that stands between the Devil and seven billion souls is God and the hapless footballing skills of one Deportivo Wanka FC.
The final battle between darkness and light has just been dropped at the feet of a Sunday football team.
God help us.
Exploring the history and current standing of the Paralympic Games, which has grown to become the world's third largest sporting event. With access to over 70 years of never-before-seen archive footage, this film will tell the incredible story of the Paralympic Games; from the visionaries who brought the Games to life to the athletes of today as they continue their journey to Tokyo 2020.
Documenting the life of Manchester United football club’s iconic former leader Alex Ferguson. With exclusive and unrestricted access to Ferguson, his family and closest friends, the film charts the manager’s early years growing up in the working-class shipbuilding district of Govan in Glasgow, via the ‘Theatre of Dreams’ at Old Trafford where he achieved unparalleled success on the football pitch, to the ICU ward at Salford Royal hospital where he was recently treated for a near-fatal brain haemorrhage.
During his 26 years with Manchester United, the revered Scot won 38 trophies, including 13 Premier League titles, five FA Cups and two Champions Leagues. While at Aberdeen before his Utd career he won three Scottish league championships, four Scottish Cups and the UEFA Cup Winners’ Cup.
Borneo, the world’s oldest rainforest, a culture near extinction. All destroyed by a sporting event viewed by billions. Three brothers from the forest, a film crew and their activist friends become undercover investigators, following the stolen wood to its final stop: Tokyo’s new Olympic Stadium.
TOUCH WOOD plays out in the build-up to the approaching Olympic spectacle, the camera following a group of friends across oceans, through a spectrum of cultures, to reveal an honest tale of a peoples’ attempt to understand the forces behind the destruction of their home. This journey, however, is not without dangers. Spying on illegal companies has obvious risks but the alienating world they discover on the way has more sinister perils.
In this character-driven documentary, the brothers are a symbol of the exploited. The Tokyo Olympics in contrast typifies the insatiable consumer society validating this type of profiteering. Whilst highlighting these clear injustices, TOUCH WOOD provides a window into how indigenous peoples view the world that is driving so much change within their own communities. In doing so, exploring the costs of humanity’s addiction to progress and the effect it is having on the globe’s most vulnerable peoples and the ecosystems they inhabit.
14 Women, 3000 Nautical Miles, X Trillion Pieces of Plastic.
X TRILLION is a film about an all-woman crew who sailed 3000 nautical miles to one of the most remote places on Earth - the North Pacific Gyre or the Great Pacific Garbage Patch. The aim was to research the densest accumulation of ocean plastic in the world.
It was a journey that promised to change not only their lives but the very future of our planet.
Director Eleanor Church was part of a team of 14 women from around the world - from scientists to packaging designers, engineers, teachers, artists and more - each one looking and learning about this issue from a very different perspective. This was eXXpedition's 10th voyage.
The crew spent three weeks sailing through the middle of this gyre, collecting scientific data for international research projects with a focus on how these trillions of pieces of micro plastics are impacting human, and particularly women’s, health.
This is a story of hope, filled with life, magic and a call to action that burns with optimism.
Biopic feature biopic about the rivalry between celebrated UK boxers Nigel Benn and Chris Eubank, charting the former world champion fighters' journeys and maverick personalities and the intense rivalry that culminated in two highly anticipated fights in the early 1990s.
Set against the backdrop of a giant hurricane that flattened Galveston, Texas in 1900. Local black champion Little Arthur must go head-to-head not only against prejudiced social and relational divides, but with a ringer from Chicago – Jim McBride – a dirty-fighting racist hired by the local Sporting Club to do one thing: Kill Little Arthur and restore the championship to a white fighter. As with the real Jack Johnson, Little Arthur further defies social constructs by being in a forbidden relationship with a white woman. Based on a Joe Landsdale novella that is inspired by the real life story of Jack Johnson, the first black heavyweight boxing champion.
Johnson was recently granted a posthumous pardon by President Donald Trump from his conviction for violating the Mann Act in 1910 at the height of the Jim Crow era in the USA.
