SEE YOU SOON: Major League Soccer As Lifetime Movie Romance

Directed by David Mahmoudieh, See You Soon is a romantic drama set against the backdrop of professional soccer, chronicling the unlikely love story between an American soccer star and a Russian single mother. If that sounds like an outlandish plot for a film, well, you won’t be disappointed by See You Soon, which is no more believable than your average Disney princess movie and unfortunately lacking in chipper musical numbers. That being said, the film isn’t without its charms thanks to its unabashedly absurd script and some very amusing references to the real-life world of soccer.

Hey Now, You’re (Apparently) an All-Star

Ryan Hawkes (Liam McIntyre, an Australian actor best known for the Starz series Spartacus) is a world-famous American soccer star, and that alone should sound warning bells in your head as to how insane this film is; that an American who plays for a fictional Los Angeles-based Major League Soccer team would somehow be so famous that little kids in Russia would worship him as a hero to the point of making handmade Hawkes jerseys was so absolutely unbelievable that even this soccer-crazed American could not properly suspend her disbelief. Even the real-life USMNT and Los Angeles Galaxy star Landon Donovan – pretty famous, to be sure – could only ever dream of reaching the level of global superstardom that Ryan Hawkes has in this movie.

Just how much of a superstar is Ryan? Well, he’s close to breaking the single-season scoring record in MLS and parlaying his goal-scoring prowess into a lucrative contract in Europe with the help of his agent (played by Harvey Keitel, whose improbable presence in this film caused me to giggle every time he appeared onscreen). He is all but certain to start for the United States national team in the upcoming World Cup in Russia – which, as the IMDb trivia page for the film helpfully points out, the U.S. did not qualify for in reality. (The magic of storytelling, indeed.) And, after he proposes to his girlfriend, TMZ is set abuzz with rumors about their upcoming glamorous nuptials.

Needless to say, Ryan has a lot of reasons to celebrate. But, one night of drunken partying ends up having catastrophic consequences for Ryan and his dreams of the future after he crashes his car while driving under the influence. Ryan wakes up in the hospital with metal pins sticking out of his leg and the possibility that he will never play soccer again, let alone at the level he was before his accident. Not sure what to do with his life if he cannot play soccer, and unable to concentrate on planning the epic wedding that his greedy girlfriend’s demands, Ryan decides he needs a change of scenery and embarks on a luxurious cruise of the Mediterranean.

Time for the Meet-Cute

On the cruise, Ryan meets Lana (Jenia Tanaeva, who also co-wrote the script and produced the film), a single mom from St. Petersburg looking for a new start after leaving her abusive, cheating husband. Lana’s son, Danny, is the aforementioned Ryan Hawkes super-fan with the homemade jersey, so needless to say, Lana is all too familiar with the ship’s most famous guest before he drunkenly introduces himself to her at the ship’s bar, where she is working as a bartender. Ryan appears set on drinking himself into a stupor every night of his voyage – that is until he begins to fall for Lana and her inspirational bon mots about how to live a better life.

Can Ryan and Lana’s fairy-tale romance survive off the ship, when Ryan must return to Los Angeles to continue his rehab and Lana must return to Russia to finalize her divorce? You likely can guess the answer to that question. Of course, that isn’t to say that their happy ending won’t come without a few melodramatic bumps in the road, including a life-threatening injury and a failure of communication that nearly ensures they never meet again. Nearly. Like I already said, there’s no point in scolding me for revealing spoilers – you know how this movie ends.

Star-Crossed and Sugary Sweet

Now, See You Soon is not a good movie. It is as sweet and fluffy and bad for your brain as cotton candy — and yet, like cotton candy, it’s also weirdly enjoyable for all of those reasons! The film does absolutely nothing halfway; every plot point is heightened to the most magnificent extremes imaginable. Because of this, while the storyline and performances in See You Soon are entirely cringe-inducing, they’re also never not entertaining. It’s Major League Soccer filtered through the lens of a Lifetime movie romance, meant to be watched with all of your friends, a few six-packs of beer, and absolutely no seriousness whatsoever.

When Ryan sees notorious obnoxious soccer pundit Alexi Lalas slandering him on TV, his impulse isn’t just to get mad – it’s to throw a heavy object at his TV screen and smash it to smithereens! (Note: the Lalas appearance is not the only hilarious cameo in See You Soon for soccer fans to appreciate.) When the cruise ends, Lana doesn’t suggest they do something normal like exchange phone numbers or email addresses – she suggests they meet at a St. Petersburg landmark at an appointed time two months in the future, Before Sunrise-style! And that doesn’t include their entire courtship, which feels like soccer-star written by a teenage girl who dreams of becoming a real-life WAG.

I do respect that Tanaeva took the initiative to co-write and produce a project for herself to star in, though I wish the final product was of a higher quality than See You Soon. The film is rife with cliched characters, from Lana’s obnoxiously jealous cruise colleague who may as well have been played by Snooki (“she’s from New Jersey, in case you couldn’t tell”) to her mafioso ex-husband. Nearly every woman in the film is portrayed in a bad light with the exception of Lana, which serves to make Ryan falling for her all the more inevitable. Once again, I understand why Tanaeva would write herself a role as such an idealistic romantic heroine, but one wishes Lana was less of a Cinderella and more of a Sally (you know, the one who met Harry).

See You Soon: Conclusion

See You Soon is absolutely absurd, but that isn’t to say I didn’t have a great deal of fun watching it. I might have giggled more than the filmmakers intended, but it’s much better than being bored by a movie, that’s for sure.

What do you think? Does See You Soon sound remotely believable as a soccer story or a romantic drama? Share your thoughts in the comments below.

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