Feature | Lights, Camera, Action! – Foxcatcher (DVD Movie Review)

By Freda Cooper 17.05.2015

Image for Feature | Lights, Camera, Action! – Foxcatcher (DVD Movie Review)

Foxcatcher (UK Rating: 15)

Director Bennett Miller has built his reputation on making films out of true stories with what appear to have limited cinematic appeal. Capote (2005) told how author Truman Capote wrote his bestseller, In Cold Blood and won Philip Seymour Hoffman an Oscar. Moneyball (2011) followed real life baseball manager Billy Beane as he tried to rebuild his team using mathematical formulae. In Foxcatcher, released on DVD on Monday, 18th May, he explores the dark side of sport - and human nature.
Image for Feature | Lights, Camera, Action! – Foxcatcher (DVD Movie Review)

The sport this time is Olympic wrestling. Mark Schultz (Channing Tatum) and his brother Dave (Mark Ruffalo) had already won gold in 1984, when billionaire John Du Pont (Steve Carell) offered to train them personally so they could win again at the Seoul Olympics. Mark accepted straight away, but Dave didn't join him until sometime later, and concentrated on working with his brother. However, he and Du Pont never got on from the start…

The film takes its audience to the more sinister side of the American dream. The Du Pont family has untold wealth and power with all the material trappings that go with it, but John's relationship with his domineering mother (Vanessa Redgrave) is distant and strained. He's taken up interests that he knows she won't like, like wrestling, in a perverse effort to get attention from a woman who he describes as having paid the chauffeur's son to be his friend when they were both young. At the time, he believed the boy was his one true friend. Combining his character with the talent and ambition of the Schultz brothers makes for a combustible mix. Paranoia, fuelled by drink and cocaine, sets in and Du Pont's obsessive nature means he sees Dave's influence on Mark as a huge threat.


 
The trio of actors at the centre of this sweaty, competitive hell are all revelations in their own right. Steve Carell as Du Pont is much more than the now-familiar prosthetics, with his strangely mannered way of speaking, and demonstrates that he's a seriously good straight actor. Despite having less screen time, Mark Ruffalo's just as impressive as Dave, the more stable of the two brothers, who's found some contentment in his life. If there's an eye-opening performance, though, it belongs to Channing Tatum as the unstable, self-loathing Mark. In the past, Tatum's taken a lot of flak for his acting and choice of films, but this shows that, given the right part and the director, he really can deliver.

It's a complex film, dark and unsettling, but Miller has stayed true to his customary style of filming, telling the story straight and allowing the power of the narrative and the acting to do the work. This time, however, some of the crucial scenes are dialogue free, underlined only by some soundtrack, and that variation in style makes them even more powerful.

Image for Feature | Lights, Camera, Action! – Foxcatcher (DVD Movie Review)

9/10
Rated 9 out of 10

Exceptional - Gold Award

Rated 9 out of 10
It may not have won the big awards it hoped for, but make no mistake: Foxcatcher is an excellent film. Its complexity means that a second watch is almost compulsory, so the DVD is more than welcome… and who is going to turn down a second - or perhaps third - chance to watch a fascinating yet disturbing story that's both superbly directed and acted?

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