The talented, twenty-year-old football pro, Mario, falls in love with Leon, a fellow player of the same age. After some initial hesitance on Mario’s part, a passionate relationship develops between the two which at the end fails due to forced self-denial and misrepresentation in the football team.

The topic of homosexuality in professional football has appeared in the media regularly in recent years. Rumours about relationships between X and Y, about fake marriages, special psychological treatment of gay players, etc. make the rounds. That this is not just some form of speculation connected to market research was demonstrated by the outing of the German Bundesliga player Thomas Hitzelsberger in January 2014. There are, in fact, gay football players. What there has not be until now, interestingly, is a theatrical release film that takes up this highly controversial topic and takes it seriously.

The “Berlin Declaration” against homophobia in sports from July 2013 was signed by well-known politicians and professional sports administrators, underscoring the relevance of the topic.

We are pursuing two objectives with the romantic drama MARIO: On the one hand dramatizing the enormous pressure and psychological burden to which gay top athletes are exposed in a domain supposedly ruled by «real men». And on the other hand, hopefully, making a contribution to the courage to change. Among the fans, the decision-makers and not least of all among the players.