Plot: Smith plays Dr. Bennet Omalu, the Nigerian immigrant Pittsburgh coroner who stumbles onto the evidence relating playing football to severe brain damage. He tries to make this known and the NFL and its fans don't make it easy.
Thoughts:
The only way I could watch this was to forget that it is based on a true story. It's the same thing I had to do with Spotlight, which is a fair comparison in a lot of ways. Both are based on true stories. Both cover relatively recent events. The protagonists have noble intentions. The cities they work in are committed to protect the thing they're investigating. I'll go ahead and say that Spotlight is the much better movie. I'm here to discuss Concussion though.
This movie only goes as far as Will Smith takes it, so in that respect, this movie is a success. Smith takes a tough role - that accent alone, in the wrong hands, could tank a movie. Just look as The Walk - and sells the hell out of it. Integrity is a tough thing to make interesting, especially when mixed with extreme intelligence. Omalu is also a man of faith. He has to be a saint in the most literal way, and I never questioned the honestly of this character. He felt real to me and Smith deserves a lot of credit for that. My favorite thing about this movie is the unbridled optimism of it. Omalu is a hero. Again, I don't care what the truth of the story is. Omalu is a heroic character that I want to believe exists. He believes that hard work and doing what's right is all that one needs to do. While I have issues with the movie overall, none of them are with the character and performance at the center of it.
This isn't a subtle movie. The script likes to beat you over the head with the points its trying to make and the camera works the angles to maximize everything in every scene. It's too much. I wish writer/director Peter Landesman would've shown restraint more often. It's clear that this kind of story appeals to him - his last script credit was for a movie called "Kill the Messenger" (also based on a true story). This badly wants to be a whistle blower thriller (think, The Firm) and the facts of the real situation repeatedly rein it in. I kind of want Landerman's next project to be a work of fiction. It seems like he might be more comfortable with that.
I feel bad that Gugu Mbatha-Raw's entire purpose is to be there to make Omalu more relatable. She had no purpose within the larger story. She's great with what she's given to do, which should be no surprise to anyone who's paid attention to her work over the last couple years. Alec Baldwin and Albert Brooks are quite good too. Baldwin is the former NFL physician who has to turn his back on basically everyone he knows in order to get the truth out there. Brooks is the mentor who keeps Omalu on the right path. They too have the problem of being bound by the story that the script is allowed to tell.
Elephant in the Room: As an NFL fan, is this going to make me angry? That's a little hard for me to say. I'm not much of a football fan so my perspective is different. This doesn't make the NFL look good. For instance, they directly compare the NFL to the tobacco companies denying the health risks of cigarettes. Anytime someone on the side of the NFL tries to defend football, the arguments aren't convincing. That said, any smart NFL fan has come to terms with all this already. None of this should be new to you. The movie may only serve to make you angry. It's similar to why, as a Kentucky basketball fan, I can't watch I movie Glory Road. Yeah, I get it, but I don't need to be reminded that they lost.
To Sum Things Up:
There's a lot of things this movie does right and almost all of them are tied to Will Smith. You should only see this if you want to see the return of the Will Smith of Ali or The Pursuit of Happyness. Otherwise, this is a thriller with very little tension.
Verdict (?): Weakly Don't Recommend
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