Foxcatcher

Bear with me, this will get long. I've literally been waiting for over a year to see this film. I remember the very early trailers last year, and telling everyone I knew that this film, "Foxcatcher", looked to be amazing. I remember when its release was delayed for several months because the film's producers wanted to make sure Steve Carrell was in contention for the Oscars. I remember all the talk about how amazing Carrell was, and how powerful the film was, and so I waited anxiously for this film to arrive in my mailbox, waiting for tonight. And the trouble is, I feel I'm still waiting. This movie never got off the ground for me. The plot felt sparse and full of holes. I never got a sense of character motivation, or growth, or why things took the turns they did. The script not only let me down, but it let down it's two main stars. Tatum was better than I've ever seen him, but the tragedy was with Carrell. He was transformative, no doubt about it. His performance was great, but the script left him with precious little screen time and not much in the way of meat to hang his hat on. Because of this, I felt this film wasted what perhaps was the performance of Carrell's life. There simply was not enough there there, and certainly not enough to deserve an Oscar nod. I would rather have seen that spot go to James McAvoy for "Filth", or maybe even to Miles Teller for "Whiplash" - certainly McAvoy's performance was better on every level than Carrell's was. All in all, it was an average film with one outstanding performance in Tatum and a very notable one in Carrell... but that's it. It's with sadness that I can only give this film 3 stars. I had hoped for so much more. 3/5

Foxcatcher on Netflix