We see more reviews on "Bigger Stronger Faster" hitting the 'net. The LA Times looked very favorably on the film:
Sylvester Stallone, Hulk Hogan, Arnold Schwarzenegger. The 1980s saw an explosion of butt-kicking in America, observes Christopher Bell in the raucously funny and surprisingly insightful prologue to his debut documentary, "Bigger, Stronger, Faster*." And as a 12-year-old kid from a loving but undeniably short and doughy family in Poughkeepsie, N.Y., Bell and his brothers were particularly susceptible to the message. As he reminds us, the don't-mess-with-the-U.S. Reagan years were an overheated response to '70s downers such as the Iran hostage crisis. But for the Bell boys, it was simply a call to ripped, bulging arms.
What began simply as a documentary about steroid use in America, "Bigger, Stronger, Faster*" (The asterisk refers to the movie's subtitle: "The Side-Effects of Being American") turns out to be a surprisingly comprehensive and insightful look at a culture predicated on might and obsessed with achieving success at any cost. This, more than rampant steroid use among professional athletes, is what makes Bell's documentary so timely and ultimately so sobering. What Bell and co-writers and producers Alex Buono (who also shot the movie) and Tamsin Rawady discover -- through countless hours of interviews, news, movie and cartoon footage as well as home video of the Bell family -- is a country in which it's literally impossible to win if one plays by the rules, because winners almost always cheat...
"Bigger, Stronger, Faster*" works so assiduously to prove that the level playing field is a myth that at times the sheer number of examples threatens to overwhelm it; it would have worked at half the size. (Like the nation, it's a documentary on steroids.) Overall, though, it's a fascinating and unexpectedly profound and melancholy meditation on what we have become as a country and on the misguided obsessions that made us this way.
The Morning Call asks if steroids are as American as apple pie?
In Christopher Bell's new documentary ''Bigger, Stronger, Faster,'' there's a fascinating clip of U.S. Sen. Joe Biden denouncing steroid use during a packed congressional hearing on performance-enhancing drugs. Juicing your way to success, he thunders, is ''simply un-American.''
Bell has a different story to tell. In the doc, which opened Friday in Philadelphia, the filmmaker wonders if steroid use isn't quintessentially American. We are a nation, Bell points out, that's obsessed not only with body-image but with being the best at everything.
Pervasive cheating: American or simply human>
Now out: Official web site with theater locations.
B
"As he reminds us, the don't-mess-with-the-U.S. Reagan years were an overheated response to '70s downers such as the Iran hostage crisis."
This is a joke, right? I guess all those other action heroes pre-dating Stallone and the Governor were just imaginary (Steve McQueen and James Bond et al would probably be pretty surprised to hear about this). And I guess that whole time when Japan messed with the US at Pearl Harbor and had their asses handed to them in return, twice, was somehow another, abnormal, event in American history. I could go on, but I think you get the point...
How can anyone state such drivel with an even remotely straight face? Oh, right: it's the LA Times, who just *love* America (and, of course, I imagine the whole scandal of doping is America's fault, too, even though the Hungarians, Russians, Chinese, etc. were the big forerunners to today's scandal-plagued, *worldwide*, doping issues).
Tip: if you want to make a documenatry (and actual one, not one that seeks to distort reality M. Moore-style) please don't subject us to your idiotic politics in the process.
Posted by: ECM | 05/31/2008 at 12:50