The Real Football Factories: A Global Tour of Hooliganism

By: Bob | June 13th, 2007

You might remember a film that came out a couple of years ago based on the John King book, The Football Factory. It featured a fictional group of Chelsea fans called the Headhunters who do battle with other hooligan groups across England, including Millwall’s Bushwhackers. The movie didn’t really work for me and was not nearly as good as the book.

One of the stars of the film, Danny Dyer, has been busy lately filming a series of documentaries about hooligan and fan culture in places from London to Argentina. I have been watching various clips of The Real Football Factories on YouTube the past few days and have to say that some of the action is quite compelling.

The clips don’t glamorize the ultras nor do they condemn them. They present the groups as they are, which is sometimes crazy, sometimes dangerous and thoroughly fascinating to those of us who have not grown up in this environment.

The clips are scattered about the Web, so I have done my best to compile them in sequence for somewhat easy viewing. Most of the parts are about 10 minutes long so be prepared to have your time gobbled up. Let me know what you think.

Argentina
Part 1 | Part 2 | Part 3 | Part 4 | Part 5

Balkans
Part 1 | Part 2 | Part 3 | Part 4 | Part 5

England
Part 1 | Part 2

Some Related Stories:

Category: World Football

« A Name to Remember: João Moutinho | Home | Transfer Talk: Hammers Get Bent, Juve Boots Camoranesi, an MLS Trade »

The Offside RSS Feeds

iasi

Forza POLI IASI!
kill for you

you did not see anything about hooliganism in turkey. there are much more thing doing around.
Dunc

Scotlands the hardest out of them all =D
letva

y just want to say dat there is no hooligans in the world like CROATIAN hooligans.

MI HRVATI!!!!!
Federico

aguante el rojo y argentina
Federico

no me deja verlos aguante el rojo y argentina
Clint

Not to be confused with the actual Headhunters, of course.

For an interesting read, check out any responsible account of the fall of Yugoslavia and how some of the most vile hooligan firms on Earth influenced the politics and violence that split the country up. Hajduk Split, Dinamo Zagreb and Partizan being three of the teams who had groups of fans that displayed a level of hyper-violence during that period that would be tough to equal - or stomach.
Tom

I've seen all three programmes in their entirety, through the magics of bittorrent. Christian, I do agree it gets VERY tiresome how EVERY game he attends is suddenly too overwhelming for words in its intensity, and every meeting he has with an ultra has him claiming he's about to pee his pants with fear.

On the other hand, to be fair, he does interview some guys who are clearly still the top dogs in their groups, and it's fascinating stuff overall.
Christian

I've seen some of the videos from Scotland and England and they are such a joke. For one, he keeps pretending that everywhere he goes is some danger zone where violence is just a step away from kicking off, and that every hooligan he talks to is some kind of psycho. But really, he only interviews guys whos USED to be thugs, but are either too old or gave it up. I haven't seen them all, but I think it's English media influence of trying to make a scandal out of anything.
Peter

I made it through the Italy series and think I need to go to church or something to cleanse my soul. Pretty cool stuff even if it is scary.
Chris

What ever happened to Harry The Dog?
Andy

I have watched the Turkey and Argentina programmes in full and if you think that England is bad!!! then you aint seen nothing yet... even Dyer was shi**ing himself (and he is a hard man) but there was alot said about camardrie and an awful lot said about corruption within the clubs featured and their fans - especially in Argentina