Manchester City goes to the movies

Sachin Nakrani's Guardian article on the new Manchester City "documentary" Blue Moon Rising ends with the line, "time will tell if the film they see, like the club's current ownership, is a lasting hit or an expensive flop." Which brings to mind the Simpsons episode when The Itchy and Scratchy Movie, after an extensive run, gives way to a new Mickey Rourke and Liza Minella vehicle. "Will it be as successful?" intones Kent Brockman. "Only time will tell."

The movie, as Nakrani rather redundantly argues, has the potential to be good, although considering the backers it's hard not to escape the fact it will certainly be a propaganda film. But what's interesting about this is how it reveals just how cannily aware Sheikh Mansour is about what is involved in transforming a relative Premier League up-and-downer into a perpetual top-four, Champions League-qualifying contender.

No, regular Top Four success does not involve being located in North London and having 'Arry "I'm not a Wheeler and Dealer" Redknapp as your manager. Tottenham's recent Champions League success is inspiring, but as I am almost dead certain this season will prove, it will also be transitory. What the billionaires behind City do know is that you have to create the idea of your club as a shared experience, a unique and historically important brand. You have to make everyone—your fans, players, the rest of the country, the world—believe your club is not only infinitely rich, but is worthy of joining the ranks of clubs whose historical importance helped ossify them as perpetual title holders in the relentlessly uncompetitive post-Bosman era, clubs like Real Madrid, Bayern Munich, Manchester United etc.

In other words, Manchester City are faced with making a fine vintage wine out of a days-old press. Manchester United's assured top four status came from a decades old mixture of public pathos after Munich and deft management just as the Premier League achieved escape velocity. Arsenal's destiny as London's premier club stretched back to Herbert Chapman, and Liverpool have the weight of all those European trophies and near-total domestic domination. Chelsea have always spent the vast majority of their existence in the top flight, part of a very carefully constructed brand going all the way back to when Henry Mears bought up some land at the end of the railway tracks. City? Well, City have a movie coming out...

Not that Manchester City doesn't have a unique and interesting history, it's just that the club—like Everton, like Tottenham—was always going to be the competing little brother of the neighbouring derby favourite, unless they worked hard to carve out a unique cultural niche. My guess is you're going to see a lot more of this sort of thing: self-made documentaries, older player profiles, the media-driven creation of a Blue Moon-sized zeitgeist. You can criticize them for creating an artificial popular interest, but in Richard Scudamore's world, the football bit is only one piece of the Top Four puzzle. Nowadays you also have to buy into popular culture.