Taika Waititi Returning To Toronto Film Festival With World Premiere Of ‘Next Goal Wins’

The Toronto Film Festival is beginning to reveal the feature slate for its 48th edition, starting off with Searchlight’s Taika Waititi soccer comedy Next Goal Wins.

The pic, directed and co-written by the Oscar winner, is inspired by the true story of the American Samoa soccer team, infamous for its brutal 31-0 loss to Australia in a 2001 World Cup qualifying match. With more qualifiers approaching, the ragtag squad hires down-on-his-luck, maverick Dutch-American coach Thomas Rongen (Michael Fassbender) in the hope he will turn the world’s worst soccer team around. Next Goal Wins is based on the 2014 documentary of the same name.

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TIFF is a special place for Waititi. At the last pre-pandemic edition of the fest in 2019, he world premiered his Hitler satire Jojo Rabbit to a standing ovation, not a common occurrence at TIFF. The movie went on to notch the TIFF Grolsch People’s Choice Award, an Oscar bellwether, and six Oscar nominations including an adapted screenplay win for Waititi.

The absurdist comedy was a bit of a cash cow for Searchlight, grossing north of $93 million worldwide off a $14M production cost.

“We’re thrilled to welcome Taika back to the festival and share his audacious take on the most popular sport in the world,” said Cameron Bailey, CEO of TIFF. “Next Goal Wins is perfect for TIFF fans of the beautiful game looking for their football fix until the 2024 World Cup arrives.”

Next Goal Wins also stars Oscar Kightley, Kaimana, David Fane, Rachel House, Beulah Koale, Uli Latukefu, Semu Filipo and Lehi Falepapalangi, with Will Arnett and Elisabeth Moss. It hits theaters November 17.

TIFF runs Sept. 7-17.

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