Beckham

Even if you were not into football then and you are not into football now, “Beckham” makes for fascinating viewing—as a document of the late nineties and early two-thousands in the U.K., with its Brit-pop and its Blairy optimism; as a record of a moment when the use of private jets and the acquisition of luxury goods by newly wealthy celebrities might have been regarded as crass but wasn’t yet deemed ethically criminal; as a portrait, albeit a flatteringly partial one, of a long-enduring marriage between famous people who seem genuinely to enjoy and admire one another.

Both the Beckhams describe the making of the documentary as “therapy” – but it will probably be just as cathartic for a generation of fans still starry-eyed with nostalgia for those halfway-line lobs.