USA has Babe Ruth, Argentina has Diego Maradona.  After the humiliating defeat Argentina suffered in The War of the Falkland Islands against England (1982), it was Diego Maradona that scored two goals  to deafeat England in a world cup match, (1986) thus restoring pride to the Argentine people.  Years of rampant cocaine use and whoring haven’t done much in the way of tarnishing the reputation of the former futbol champion.  In fact, his lifestyle, outspoken hatred of George Bush, and his friendships with Fidel Castro and Hugo Chavez have only contributed to his legendary status in Argentina and worldwide.

Accomplished Serbian filmmaker Emir Kusturica has just finished a documentary about Diego Maradona which screened not to long ago at Cannes.  In case you haven’t seen any of Kusturica’s films, do yourself a favor.  His best include Black Cat White Cat, The Time of the Gypsies, Life is a Miracle and Underground. Like all of his films, Maradona is largely musical, featuring music of Kusturica’s own band, The No Smoking Orchestra, which is a sort of gypsy punk extravoganza. Check out their myspace page.  The film also features french/spanish wanna-be-south-american singer Manu Chau singing a song he wrote especially for the documentary.  Here’s the trailor for the film, though no word on when it might come out on wide release.

Now Kusturica has opened his own township, in the hills of Serbia. The town which is called Kustendorf, also has a film festival, the first of which happened this year in january. The festival reportedly opened in a cemetery with a burial of the worst hollywood film of the year, Diehard 4. Kusturica also has plans of opening a film school in the town. Read all about it here.