The gender pay gap is an issue that, sadly, affects most (if not all) industries so women’s sport is no exception.
In LFG, the issue of inequality when it comes to female athletes salaries is explored from the perspective of the United States women’s national soccer team as they embarked on their very public and controversial fight for equal pay.
Players such as Megan Rapinoe, Jessica McDonald, Becky Sauerbrunn and others lend their voices to LFG, as it takes an intimate look inside the historic gender-discrimination, class-action lawsuit filed by America’s most successful soccer team against their employer, the U.S. Soccer Federation to prove their worth — and ultimately that of the millions of women around the world who are also paid less than their male peers. The lawsuit was filed just three months before the team’s incredible World Cup victory.
Following a year in the players’ lives via behind-the-scenes moments and interviews, LFG gives viewers unprecedented access to the physical demands and pressures of being among the world’s top athletes, showcasing the players’ courage, unflinching spirit, and resiliency in an effort to create lasting social change.
The US Soccer Federation declined to participate in the film.
“I don’t think the US Soccer Federation wanted this film to be made,” filmmaker Sean Fine told The Guardian in June 2021.
“I don’t think they are very excited about it now. They hold the access to filming these women behind the scenes and out on the fields, and they made it very clear to us that if this film was about equal pay, they wouldn’t allow that to happen.”
Like so any others Fine, and his wife and fellow filmmaker, Andrea Nix Fine, found production on the project impacted by the pandemic and both admit they, at one point, feared that perhaps the subject matter wasn’t as important as the COVID situation and Black Lives Matter protests that dominated 2020.
“The zeitgeist of this moment actually turned out to be the whole idea of equality and value and how we treat others and what’s right,” Andrea told The Guardian. “It’s actually a pretty amazing time for people to be thinking about this and for these women to express themselves the way they did.”
LFG will start streaming in Australia on September 15 only on Paramount+. Check out the trailer below.
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