It can be difficult to imagine football competitions not being the somewhat sordid domain of more or less disreputable billionaires, but people wouldn’t keep watching games if the sport itself wasn’t fun. The documentary The Home Game, directed by Smari Gunn and Logi Sigursveinsson, could revive the passion of any lapsed fan and no doubt create new ones, as happens in the film itself. The film has won the Audience Award at the Glasgow Film Festival, reportedly scoring the highest-ever audience score in the award’s 10-year history.

But this story begins as the tale of a broken dream. In 1994, in the small Icelandic village of Hellissandur, local football coach Vidar Gylfason decided to build a regulation pitch for the village’s 369 inhabitants — no easy feat in any circumstances, but perhaps especially on freezing ground partially composed of lava. However, this was not to be the biggest hurdle for this beloved member of the community: his ultimate goal was for Hellissandur to host an actual, official FA Cup game. The twist here is so cruel that had a screenwriter come up with it, it would have seemed unrealistic: although the new local club Reynir FC was selected, it was for an away game, therefore not on the brand-new football pitch in the village. To make matters worse, the team ended up losing 10-0.

One could imagine this experience profoundly wounding Vidar, but apart from a dislike of football, he appears to have remained a rather cheerful and driven person — qualities he has clearly transmitted to his son, Kari. The latter, a father in his thirties, is the main subject of the film: his plan is to finally put to rights what went so wrong for his father some thirty years prior and bring a home game to Hellissandur. The filmmakers are perhaps a little too polite in their approach to their subjects, never delving very deep into their character or probing their motivations. But this simply isn’t that kind of film: the mission is the thing, and most of the runtime is taken up with Kari’s preparations before he can actually enter the lottery for the next FA Cup.

It isn’t long before his enthusiasm is met with resistance, and family members affectionately describe a man who loves to start seemingly impossible projects. However, we are told that he usually finishes them, and sure enough, he successfully gathers a team of players that even includes some of the amateur footballers who were so profoundly humbled back in the 1990s. Although the project is led by an infectious can-do spirit, it isn’t without some awkwardness, which the filmmakers thankfully choose not to conceal: seeing this plucky group of people overcome whatever shame or shyness they might feel is genuinely inspiring.

Ironically, the one person from the original iteration of the local club who went on to become a professional player is a woman — and so, the most qualified member of Reynir FC is not legally allowed to play a FA Cup game. But Kari insists that she joins the team, and her presence is another way in which the film celebrates a generous, open, and truly fun vision of football. At the home game — which, as the film’s title perhaps indicates, does indeed take place — the team’s goal is not to win against a much more talented and experienced adversary. Although they hope to do better than lose 10-0, by the time they step onto that field and the match begins, these largely amateur players have already realised a dream. This makes for an absolutely riveting game, a sudden burst of adrenaline that seems to surprise even the players themselves and makes for a fitting conclusion to what is an otherwise pleasant but rather monotonous film.

The Home Game was produced by Iceland’s Silver Screen. International sales are handled by Met Film (UK).