The Racer

The grim determination of an athlete contemplating his final race.

(2020) Sports Drama (Gravitas) Louis Talpe, Matteo Simoni, Tara Lee, Iain Glen, Karel Roden, Timo Wagner, Diogo Cid, Ward Kerremans, Paul Robert, Anthony Mairs, Ozan Saygi, Sebaastian Collet, Charles Sobry, Clarissa Vermaark, Molly McCann, Lalor Roddy, Reamonn O’Byrne, Breffni Holahan, Denis Joussein, Marco Lorenzini, Colin Slattery, Sarah Carroll. Directed by Kieron J. Walsh

 

Even those who aren’t cycling fans are aware that the Tour de France is the most famous race in the sport, the pinnacle of achievement. However, those who aren’t cycling fans may well know of the scandal that struck the sport in 1998 when whole teams and some of the biggest stars of the sport were discovered to be doping with performance-enhancing drugs.

The 1998 race was further unusual that the prologue stages took place in Ireland rather than in France (the World Cup was being held in France at the time and the organizers of the Race wanted to eliminate any overlap). Team Austrange is a leading contender to win the event, as is their lead cyclist, Lupo “Tartare” Marino (Simoni). The ice-cold coach “Viking” (Roden) has at his disposal a team that includes the veteran domestique – support rider meant to set the pace and allow the lead cyclist to utilize his draft in order to minimize effort, before making a sprint for the finish – Dominique Chabol (Talpe). Chabol, however, is getting on in years – he’s 39 – and even though he has given years of his life to the team, Viking is eager to put a younger rider into the position.

However, when that rider is disqualified for failing a blood test, the team reinstates Chabol who is beginning to question his loyalty. He is close to the trainer, ex-rider Sonny McElhone (Glen) and is developing a romantic relationship with the Irish team doctor (Lee), while seeing to the needs of the high-strung Tartare and trying to avoid letting the authorities that nearly the entire team is doping. His rivalry with Stefanio Drago (Wagner) which erupted in bad blood the previous year is also rearing its ugly head.

This is essentially a competently made sports drama, and when it sticks to that, the film works very well indeed. Unfortunately, it tries to take on too many plot elements and, in the end, feels as much of a soap opera as a sports drama. The race sequences are exciting and Talpe does a great job of portraying an athlete nearing the end of his career. He looks natural on a bike, and one has to assume he’s done his share of riding.

I’m not sure how much interest the film will generate in the United States; cycling isn’t a very big deal here, particularly since Lance Armstrong essentially tarnished the sport for most casual followers. However, European readers and North American readers into cycling will probably get into this big time. There really isn’t anything overtly wrong with the film other than the extraneous elements of the romance with the Irish doctor, and some predictable plot points – a health issue with a key character, a young teammate who objects to the team doping culture, and so on  There is also nothing particularly outstanding about the movie, other than the cycling sequences and they are key to whether you are going to enjoy the movie or not. If sports dramas are your thing, you might get into this even if you’re not necessarily a cycling fan. If you aren’t into sports dramas, there’s probably nothing here that will capture your interest. Choose accordingly.

REASONS TO SEE: Well-paced and well-photographed.
REASONS TO AVOID: Non-cycling fans may get a little bit lost.
FAMILY VALUES: There is profanity and drug use.
TRIVIAL PURSUIT: The scene in which the peloton crashes was not staged or rehearsed; it’s an actual accident, and Timo Wagner, the actor who played Drago, spent the night in the hospital.
BEYOND THE THEATER: Amazon, Fandango Now, Google Play, Microsoft, Redbox, Vudu, YouTube
CRITICAL MASS: As of 10/2/20: Rotten Tomatoes: No score yet; Metacritic: No score yet.
COMPARISON SHOPPING: Breaking Away
FINAL RATING: 6/10
NEXT: A Call to Spy

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New Releases for the Week of June 9, 2017

THE MUMMY

(Universal) Tom Cruise, Russell Crowe, Annabelle Wallis, Sofia Boutella, Courtney B. Vance, Jake Johnson, Marwan Kenzari, Sean Cameron Mitchell. Directed by Alex Kurtzman

The brand new Dark Universe shared cinematic universe featuring Universal’s classic movie monsters kicks off here with the story of an evil curse, safely entombed for millennia beneath the sands of Egypt, unwittingly reawakened by an American adventurer. Now cursed himself, he must race against time to stop a creature of pure malevolence with the aid of Dr. Henry Jekyll, the head of a mysterious multinational corporation called Prodigium.

See the trailer, clips and video features here.
For more on the movie this is the website.
Release Formats: Standard, 3D, IMAX 3D
Genre: Horror Action
Now Playing: Wide Release
Rating: PG-13 (for violence, action and scary images and for some suggestive content and partial nudity)

11:55

(Gravitas) Victor Almanzar, Julia Stiles, Elizabeth Rodriguez, John Leguizamo. After serving honorably in the Middle East, a U.S. Marine comes home hoping to return to civilian life while turning his back on his violent past. However, sometimes there’s no escaping one’s past.

See the trailer here.
For more on the movie this is the website.
Release Formats: Standard
Genre: Crime Drama
Now Playing: AMC Loew’s Universal Cineplex
Rating: NR

It Comes at Night

(A24) Joel Edgerton, Christopher Abbott, Carmen Ejogo, Riley Keough. As an apocalyptic event decimates the world, a man, his wife and son hole up in a remote home. When a desperate family arrives at his door seeking refuge, he decides to give it to him but soon paranoia and mistrust give way to something within that may be worse than what lies outside the walls of his compound.

See the trailer, clips, interviews and a video feature here.
For more on the movie this is the website.
Release Formats: Standard
Genre: Horror
Now Playing: Wide Release
Rating: R (for violence, disturbing images and language)

Megan Leavey

(Bleecker Street) Kate Mara, Tom Felton, Common, Ramon Rodriguez. A young woman, unable to socialize properly and adrift through life, decides to enlist in the U.S. Marines to see if she can find a direction for herself. After a disciplinary hearing leaves her to being assigned kennel clean-up duty she enlists in the K9 unit and is assigned Rex, an unruly and aggressive dog. Somehow the two misfits manage to bond and form an impressive team until one misstep puts both their fates in jeopardy.

See the trailer, clips, an interview and a featurette here.
For more on the movie this is the website.
Release Formats: Standard
Genre: True Life War Drama
Now Playing: Wide Release
Rating: PG-13 (for war violence, language, suggestive material, and thematic elements)

My Cousin Rachel

(Fox Searchlight) Rachel Weisz, Sam Claflin, Iain Glen, Holliday Grainger. A young English man during the Regency era plots revenge against his beautiful cousin, believing that she murdered his guardian. However, as he gets to know her he begins to fall for her romantically – but is she the innocent he believes she is or a cold blooded murderess he first thought she was?

See the trailer, a clip and a featurette here.
For more on the movie this is the website.
Release Formats: Standard
Genre: Drama
Now Playing: AMC Disney Springs, Cinemark Artegon Marketplace, Regal Oviedo Marketplace, Regal Waterford Lakes, Regal Winter Park Village
Rating: PG-13 (for some sexuality and brief strong language)

ALSO OPENING IN ORLANDO/DAYTONA

Ami Tumi
I Called Him Morgan
Raabta

ALSO OPENING IN MIAMI:

David Lynch: The Art Life
Es Por Tu Bien
Godha
I, Daniel Blake

ALSO OPENING IN TAMPA:

The Exception
Legion of Brothers

ALSO OPENING IN JACKSONVILLE:

Horror Express
Like Crazy

 

New Releases for the Week of January 27, 2017

RESIDENT EVIL: THE FINAL CHAPTER

(Screen Gems) Milla Jovovich, Ali Larter, Iain Glen, Shawn Roberts, Eoin Macken, Fraser James, Ruby Rose, William Levy, Cobalt, Ever Anderson. Directed by Paul W.S. Anderson

Alice has survived years of the Umbrella Corporation’s apocalyptic mutagenic plague. Done being on the defense she is going to take the war to them – to where it all began more than a decade ago. Alice is coming to Raccoon City and the Umbrella Corp’s headquarters and God help you if you’re an executive because she’s not going to forgive and forget.

See the trailer here.
For more on the movie this is the website.
Release Formats: Standard, 3D, IMAX 3D
Genre: Horror Action
Now Playing: Wide Release
Rating: R (for sequences of violence throughout)

A Dog’s Purpose

(Universal) Dennis Quaid, Josh Gad (voice), Peggy Lipton, Britt Robertson. A dog finds meaning through his various reincarnations in this Lasse Hallström adaptation of a beloved bestseller. The movie has come under fire from PETA after TMZ released a video purporting to show a dog being forced into the water when he was clearly not willing to go. That video has since been shown to have been highly edited and contained footage using a CGI dog. PETA is calling for a boycott of the movie; I’m calling for a boycott of PETA by making a point of going to see this more than once.

See the trailer and a featurette here.
For more on the movie this is the website.
Release Formats: Standard
Genre: Family
Now Playing: Wide Release
Rating: R (for sexual material, language, nudity and some drug use)

The Eagle Huntress

(Sony Classics) Daisy Ridley (narrator), Aisholpan Nurgaiv, Rys Nurgaiv. A young girl in rural Mongolia strives to do something no other woman has done in 2,000 years – become an Eagle Hunter, a traditionally male role of training and utilizing an eagle to hunt down game, which in the harsh winters of Mongolia can be the difference between survival and starvation. She goes to the annual Golden Eagle festival to take on 70 male hunters in an attempt to prove herself not just for herself but for all Mongolian women desiring to break out of the strictures their male-dominated society has enforced on them.

See the trailer, clips and a featurette here.
For more on the movie this is the website.
Release Formats: Standard
Genre: Documentary
Now Playing: Regal Winter Park Village
Rating: NR

Gold

(Weinstein) Matthew McConaughey, Edgar Ramirez, Bryce Dallas Howard, Corey Stoll. A modern day prospector with a touch of gold fever hasn’t had much luck in finding his own mother lode. He searches the forests of Indonesia, certain that the path to wealth and happiness lies in finding a massive gold deposit there. When he finds it, he discovers that keeping his wealth is a lot harder than finding it and that the boardrooms of Wall Street are far more dangerous than the jungles of Indonesia.

See the trailer and a clip here.
For more on the movie this is the website.
Release Formats: Standard
Genre: True Life Drama
Now Playing: Wide Release
Rating: R (for language throughout and some sexuality/nudity)

Eye in the Sky

The final onscreen performance of Alan Rickman is a good one.

(2016) Thriller (Bleecker Street) Helen Mirren, Alan Rickman, Aaron Paul, Phoebe Fox, Bakhad Abdi, Jeremy Northam, Iain Glen, Richard McCabe, Monica Dolan, Kim Engelbrecht, Ebby Weyime, Babou Ceesay, Faisa Hassan, Aisha Takow, Armaan Haggio, Carl Beukes, Bob Chappell, Daniel Fox, Jessica Jones, Michael O’Keefe, Laila Robins, Lex King. Directed by Gavin Hood

Warfare is full of shades of grey. The morality of killing other people for political or economic purposes is shaky to begin with but in modern war, killing can be done with the touch of a button and with a change from armies facing each other in remote places into terrorists in urban places, war can come to the population. Of course, in the 20^th century that had already taken place but now there is no place a military strike can’t take place, or at least very few places with the advent of drones.

A multi-national task force is tracking an English radicalized terrorist (King) with ties to Al Habaab in Kenya. In an operations center in Britain, Colonel Katherine Powell (Mirren) is coordinating with her superior, Lt. General Frank Benson (Rickman) as they observe her activities in a house in a terrorist-run part of the city. They have eyes on through the use of drones, piloted by American airman Steve Watts (Paul). On the ground in Kenya they have Jama Farah (Abdi) who is observing the house directly.

At first they think they hit paydirt when their target meets with some high-level terrorist officers, but their satisfaction turns to concern when they discover that a suicide bombing is being planned for and executed out of the house. That changes the color of the mission and frantic calls start going up the chain of command asking for and receiving an authorization to use a Hellfire missile to take out the terrorists. But things get further complicated when a little girl sets up a bread stand outside the terrorist house; the drone controller begins to have doubts and the calls up the ladder take a more urgent tone. Suddenly those who were eager to authorize the mission earlier are passing the buck, while time ticks away. Is the life of a single girl worth the dozens of lives that might be taken if the suicide bombers carry out their mission?

I don’t know that the movie really intends to answer that question; in fact, it can’t really be answered. From a strictly numbers viewpoint the answer is no – the people who might be killed by the suicide bomber are no less innocent and no less important than the life of a little girl. The question really is does knowingly ordering an airstrike that will be likely the death of a little girl more monstrous than allowing a bombing to take place when it could have been prevented. And that’s where the waters become a little bit murkier because we get into political territory then.

But that’s as may be. As a movie, Eye in the Sky does a credible job of keeping the tension high, although there are times when I thought they were being overly redundant in explaining that when you bring politicians into a military matter, things tend to get worse rather than better for while a soldier is more interested in accomplishing their particular mission, a politician is more concerned about covering their own derrieres.

And in conveying that message, Hood inserted some prestigious performers in key roles. Mirren is as gifted an actress as there is in the business, and her hawkish, shrill colonel is as stiff as a ramrod, as pitiless as a predator and as patient as a boiling teakettle. Colonel Powell is in many ways the epitome of a military mind, very centered and focused on completing the task at hand. Powell in and of herself is basically not very likable, but Mirren makes her human, a deceptively difficult job.

The late Alan Rickman, who passed away this past January and who will be much missed by this critic, never disappointed during his career and went out on a high note. In all honesty his General Benson is the epitome of a liaison, trying to balance the needs of the soldier with the needs of the politicians and having to stand on one leg while holding an umbrella over his back with a teacup balanced on the tip of his nose. Rickman gives the part some humanity as the one character who truly sees both sides of the argument.

Paul, who won three Emmys for Breaking Bad hasn’t really had a role in the movies that has utilized him as well as this one did. He is an airman with a conscience, one who doesn’t blindly follow orders but questions them when the orders appear to be morally ambiguous. In many ways, he had the most complicated role of the three main leads, but he shows that his award-winning performances were no fluke.

Is this manipulative? You bet it is. There is nothing more innocent than a little girl who is trying to help her family by selling the bread her mama baked to her neighbors going to market. That makes the moral issue a bit more focused, but it is a bit lazy – I don’t doubt that those in command of executing drone strikes find any civilian casualties wrenching, whether the victims are cute little girls or old alcoholic men. Taking the life of a non-combatant is not an easy thing for the military, as Rickman so eloquently expresses near the end of the film: “Don’t dare to presume that a military man doesn’t understand the cost of war.”

This is a movie that, if you’ll forgive an unintended pun, flew under the radar. However it is a crackerjack of a movie that should be sought out on VOD or in the near future, on home video. The performances here are scintillating and the questions raised timely and difficult. In many ways this is not only a thinking person’s war film, but a suspense film of the highest order.

Hood is not really trying to send a political message, or at least I don’t think he is. He is simply presenting the world as it is; that when killing comes down to the touch of a button, the morality of it becomes far murkier. And that’s a very powerful subject matter indeed.

REASONS TO GO: Edge of the seat suspense. Tremendous performances by most of the leads. Grapples with the morality of modern warfare.
REASONS TO STAY: Is guilty of being manipulative. Drags in places.
FAMILY VALUES: Violent images, adult themes and rough language, as well as children in peril.
TRIVIAL PURSUIT: Rickman’s final on-screen appearance; he also lends his voice to Alice through the Looking Glass.
CRITICAL MASS: As of 5/28/16: Rotten Tomatoes: 95% positive reviews. Metacritic: 73/100.
COMPARISON SHOPPING: Good Kill
FINAL RATING: 7.5/10
NEXT: Embers