Stream It Or Skip It: ‘Mexico 86’ on Netflix, a Fictionalized “True Story” of Mexico’s Big World Cup Bid, Anchored by Diego Luna

As the launch of the 2026 World Cup looms, Mexico 86 (now on Netflix) arrives with a story of organizational corruption within the sport. Coincidence? Likely not. Director Gabriel Ripstein’s satire opens with the cheeky tagline “Some of these events did happen,” and casts Diego Luna as the fictional shyster who greased palms and compulsively fibbed his way to Mexico’s against-the-odds successful bid to host the 1986 World Cup.

Those looking for another rah-rah underdog sports movie should look elsewhere, though. This film is more about poisoned ambition than who puts the ball in the net. MEXICO 86: STREAM IT OR SKIP IT? The Gist: In voiceover, Martin de la Torre (Luna, Andor, Y tu Mama Tambien) asserts that the World Cup renders its host country “the center of the universe,” and trumpets himself as the unsung hero who brought the futbol (soccer for you stupide Americains) tournament to his beloved Mexico.

It’s 1983, and cigarette smoke all but blots out the foreground of the scene as Martin sits in his wood-paneled office where he’s a paper-pusher for the Mexican Football Federation, or FEMEXFUT. He leaves work and beelines to his apartment building but not his own apartment, for an afternoon tryst with Susana (Karla Souza), then downstairs to promptly get in a fight with his wife Beatriz (Diana Sedano). “Mediocre at home, mediocre at work” is Martin’s brutally concise self-assessment. Such discontentment prompts him to lean heavily into his sneaky-greasy qualities, which allegedly makes him a fun movie protagonist you kinda admire for his energy and spirit. Amidst significant sociopolitical strife, Colombia backs out of hosting the 1986 Cup, the pragmatic opportunity for Martin.

He walks into his longtime soccer bar for a drink, and experiences the general public ennui towards the Mexican national team — they’d been megabutt for years — in microcosm as he argues with a patron who’d rather watch telenovelas than the game. That’s the bigger motivation, the ideological pursuit of reinvigorating national pride.

Also surely Martin’s desire to be a big-shot power player, but he’d surely you rather believe that’s beside the point. So Martin begins to stack big gamble atop big gamble to make himself that big-shot. He leaks FEMEXFUT’s bid to host the ’86 Cup to the press. He rallies support from Emilio Azcarraga, the rich and influential head of broadcasting conglomerate Televisa.

He weasels his way into becoming the president of FEMEXFUT. He strategically distributes leather satchels full of cash. He opens the door for superstar player Hugo Sanchez (Memo Villegas) to rake in scads of sponsorship dough. He plays politics with the Cup selection committee in Zurich and he gets the votes.

It’s gonna happen. Mexico’s economy and sense of country will be rejuvenated! And no one deserves more credit than Martin! Oh, he also divorces his wife and shacks up with Susana, who seems far too smart to commit to this smiley glad-hander, but not many of us can account for matters of the heart.

Regardless, Martin has it all, doesn’t he? What Movies Will It Remind You Of? Mexico 86 is roughly a blend of The Damned United and Next Goal Wins crossed with The Wolf of Wall Street and The Informant! Performance Worth Watching: Although Luna’s rather entertaining performance is one that grabs you by the lapels and shouts charisma!!!!! in your face, the writing more often than not tends to fail him.

It’s a bit easier to connect with Souza, whose character aligns with Martin until she doesn’t, and therefore functions as a potent audience analog. Sex And Skin: A very brief glimpse of hindquarters. Our Take: High-minded, high-potential ideas course through Mexico 86, the big one being pride. There’s two sides to the pride coin – the noble one that puts national solidarity before individual concerns, and the selfish one that feeds the concerns of the ego – and it tends to stand precariously on its edge.

That’s absolutely true for Martin, and the film essentially shows us what happens when his coin lands ego-side-up. The 1985 Mexico City earthquake is a key symbolic component in the development of this idea; when the tragedy forces FIFA to consider moving the Cup to Germany, Martin uses national pride to drum up enthusiasm to keep the event in Mexico, and capitalizes on the opportunity to be the country’s savior. Perhaps it goes without saying that opportunism in such a context finds Martin, a shameless, whatever-it-takes, compulsive liar and manipulator, standing on ethically shaky ground. Beyond that rich thematic thread, however, the film is a frustratingly slight character study, and functions best with a working knowledge of Mexican and FIFA politics. (Casual observers, be prepared to feel like you’re missing a bevy of inside jokes.) We’re left with the lingering sense that Mexico 86 tries to do far too much in 95 minutes, and the story might’ve been better served via miniseries format, which would allow the narrative to stretch out for greater political context and further exploration of what makes Martin tick, what inspires him to be a fixer, a striver, a representative of the filmmakers’ critical overtures.

As it stands, Martin is a question mark of a protagonist, more headscratcher than bearer of mystique. Luna gives a colorful and gregarious performance, but without more moments of contemplation and vulnerability, he never truly inspires our empathy or disgust as a corporeal representation of poisoned ambition and corruption. Martin is too much of a standard-issue Brylcreemed backstabber the likes of which we’ve seen dozens of times in other movies, and he climbs and falls too quickly in a film that plays like a truncated shorthand version of an epic saga. Mexico 86 had a golden opportunity to be a well-timed, razor of a satire, but as executed, it’s ultimately more akin to Hugo missing that decisive penalty kick.

Our Call: Mexico 86’s ambition is palpable, and Luna is typically entertaining. But the film ultimately falls short of its grand goals. SKIP IT. John Serba is a freelance film critic from Grand Rapids, Michigan.

Werner Herzog hugged him once.