Documentary: Frankfurt - Exploring Eva Karene Romero's Brilliant Film Analysis

Frankfort is a documentary by Ramiro Gómez that chronicles the Paraguayan national soccer team’s journey during the 2006 World Cup. The film offers a unique perspective by capturing the experiences of rural football players in Paraguay as they watch and follow the team’s exploits from home.

Eva Karene Romero (2013) Frankfurt (2008): Documentary and the Campesino Icon in Paraguay, Journal of Latin American Cultural Studies: Travesia, 22:2, 195-212, DOI: 10.1080/ 13569325.2013.795132

Frankfurt represents a unique metaphor with which to explore the interwoven discursive threads of rural life, nacionalismo futbolero, religiosity, Paraguay’s location in the global neoliberal world market and the division of Paraguayan classes.

campesino (noun) - Merriam Webster Dictionary

: a native of a Latin American rural area 
especially : a Latin American Indian farmer or farm laborer

nacionalismo futbolero

: Fanatic emotion cuts across geography and class to rhetorically join disparate groups

The film is a great example of Latin American cultural documentaries, capturing the lives of campesino farmers in Central America. I came across an excellent piece written about the film, and since I could never do a better job than the author, Eva Karene Romero, I will review her analysis, focusing on concepts that are universal in the world of international football.

1. Inequality - This theme is evident from the very beginning of the film, as it transitions from the grandeur of a European tournament setting to the rural Paraguayan countryside, where the story unfolds.

Frankfurt calls attention to the divide between the fans who watch from home and the fans at the stadium. The documentary’s establishing shot is taken from the ground, drawing attention to the dirt floor in the home and a young man’s bare foot wearing a flip-flop despite the cold winter weather

2. Nationalism - The film highlights the family's unwavering commitment to watching World Cup footage despite technical difficulties. Even when forced to rely on the radio, they remain determined to share this collective moment with the rest of the nation.

Perhaps what is being sold most essentially through World Cup football is nationalism itself, and by extension citizenship.

With citizenship marketed as a form of consumerism, campesinos are meant to feel that they are getting something, at least the feeling of inclusion, for their participation in the nation-state, while simultaneously an avenue for potential future product consumption is affectively carved into place through the spectacular, through a football event that allows one to experience citizenship emotionally.

3. Consumerism - The analysis argues that being a fan is an act of consumption, a way of participating in a shared experience.

Frankfurt is dominated by scenes in which campesino fans participate in the 2006 World Cup by consuming the mass-mediated games through television broadcasts. In multiple scenes the television is framed as if it were another member of the family.

The television can be read as an element of empire, but it may also be read as the only window to participation (through consumption). 

4. Isolationism - While the film showcases Paraguay’s collective pride and unity in watching the World Cup, it also explores the widening gap between fans and players.

Leite Lopes argues that the increased commercialization of football has resulted in a widening gap between the players in Latin America (Brazil, specifically in his case) and the players who are snatched up by European clubs at a young age. When those players are bumped up to the next level, they are geographically removed from the space which they would otherwise be helping to renew through contact with other young players.

5. Identity -  The nation’s geopolitical history lingers in the background, shaping the narrative and its themes.

Frankfurt’s ambiguity is further expressed in the way it threads its way back and forth between ‘winning and losing’ and between trauma and relief. Paraguay’s historical border wars continue to play an essential role in national film production and, more broadly, in the construction of Paraguayan national identity itself.

Perhaps Frankfurt asks Paraguayans to look at their condition: are we in the same spot as we were after the Triple Alliance War? Have we substituted colonialism and empire for the neoliberal world order?

By the end of the film, the spectator may have seen nacionalismo futbolero and country-side religiosity as the ultimate expressions of passionate detachment from failed politics; as distraction where political action should be; or at worst, as fragmentary remains stubbornly blocking national modernization.

At first glance, the film appears to be a simple documentary, but Ramiro Gómez has an uncanny ability to become a fly on the wall. He masterfully captures the genuine emotions of the family he documents, and in doing so, brings to life some of the most important themes in Latin American society.

I would like to thank Eva Karene Romero for her scholarly work and beautiful analysis of these universal themes.