Gerard158

I enjoyed the movie as a whole, while it obviously rehashes some aspects of the first film, it felt different enough to keep me engaged. The film looks great, the arena scenes are well done and entertaining, and best of all Denzel Washington is in such superb form that he steals the whole movie with ease. Which leads me to the flaws. The biggest one is Paul Mescal, not that he's really bad, he's not. He is just not good enough. You don't empathise with him, there is no real character arc, he just delivers an run of the mill bland leading man performance. I think the script suggests that his character is full of rage because of his childhood or his recent loss, but you don't really feel this in Mescals performance, he comes across as quite affable and grounded. Some of this is without doubt the scripts fault, but ultimately Mescal has to take a lot of the blame for not creating a character that we the audience root for, and this is the ultimate reason the film doesn't reach it full emotional and dramatic potential.

This film opens an important dialogue but does so while being clever and entertaining and never dull or preachy. The major achievement is the films humour and tone, it keeps you engaged with some heavy subject matter and is always on point. There is some farfetched plotting and some contrivances that don't quite work, this didn't ruin the film for me, but probably did stop it from being a stone cold classic. Great acting all roind too.

This is a solid movie with an effecting story line. It all works because of Ben Afflecks strong performance, and director O'Connors detailed direction. The basketball games feel authentic and it rarely feels manipulative. Probably more of a guys movie. I really enjoyed it.