AFI Diary #4: "Jockey," Audience Award Winners and More

Christopher James wrapping up his 2021 AFI Fest coverage. 

JOCKEY wins the Audience Award

Phew! The AFI Film Festival is done. The weekend was full of lots of great movies from around the world and some high profile premieres, such as Swan Song, Tick, Tick... Boom, and Bruised ! Still, there are a few more reviews to wrap up the festival with including Jockey, starring Clifton Collins Jr, which took the Audience Award for Narrative Feature...

AFI Fest Award Winners

• Audience Award - Narrative Feature - Jockey (Dir: Clint Bentley)
• Audience Award - Documentary Feature - Juice WRLD (Dir: Tommy Oliver)
• Audience Award - Short Film - Only the Moon Stands Still (明月依旧) (Dir: Johnson Cheng)

• Grand Jury Prize - Animation - Love, Dad (Dir: Diana Cam Van Nguyen)
• Grand Jury Prize - Live Action - Al-Sit (Dir: Suzannah Mirghani)

Reviews

Jockey (Clint Bentley)
There’s a whole genre of movie called “gruff older man hurts himself at his profession rather than talking to a therapist,” and Jockey runs squarely on this track. Thankfully, Clifton Collins Jr. makes Jockey worth seeing thanks to his incredible, lived-in performance as Jackson Silva, an aging jockey trying to not acknowledge that his time in the saddle might be nearly over. It’s fantastic to see the character actor get his due with a leading role. He breathes life to every broken bone and every internal wound of Jackson.

One of the best jockeys in the business, Jackson thinks he has a shot at another grand win. With the help of his trainer, Ruth (Molly Parker), they believe they have a winning horse on their hand. The only thing holding Jackson back is his body. He struggles to get down his weight, has a terminal spinal cord injury and has a laundry list of broken bones. Additionally, Jackson meets another young jockey, Gabriel (Moises Arias), who claims to be his long lost son.

In his directorial debut, Clint Bentley proves to have a strong visual eye and a passion for the subject. During his introduction to the film, Bentley mentioned that his Father was a jockey and that he never saw this world properly depicted in the film. That level of authenticity is present throughout the film. Many professional jockeys and non-actors share their experiences (and a catalog of their ailments). It’s definitely a level of detail into the world of jockeys that we’ve never seen before. The cinematography by Adolpho Veloso lovingly frames Collins’ Jackson against crackling fires and beautiful vistas. When we go to the races, we don’t see the other horses. We only see a closeup of Jackson in his element. It’s transfixing. There’s a lot of care and heart to Bentley’s direction. That can also be a double-edged sword. In trying to authentically take us into the world of jockeys, there are large patches of scenes that get into the weeds of the business and stall the story. Once we’re back, the father-son storyline builds to a whimper of a conclusion.

It’s easy to see why this won the Audience Award at AFI Fest. The film presents a new world in a familiar package. Add in a sensational performance from Clifton Collins Jr. and you have a crowd pleaser. Still, the movie plays it a bit too safe in the script department to take it to the next level. B

Jockey will be released in theaters on December 29th, 2021 by Sony Pictures Classics.

Great Freedom (Grosse Freiheit) (Sebastian Meise) - Austria’s Official International Feature Film Oscar® Submission

Any movie that starts off with a montage of men cruising is off to a good start. Austria’s International Feature submission Great Freedom isn’t a saucy romp though. It’s an engaging drama that spans three decades in the life of men who are imprisoned for their desires. 

Under Paragraph 175 in postwar Germany, men could be imprisoned for any homosexual acts. This is what sends Hans (Franz Rogowski) to prison multiple times between 1945 and 1969, when the law was overturned. Over the decades, Hans finds other “175 men,” some of whom he falls in love with and spends romantic evenings huddled in the cold under the eye of armed guards. However, the central relationship in his life is between a murderer named Viktor (Georg Freidrich). Hans and Viktor were cellmates during Hans’ initial imprisonment. Upon seeing that Hans was “a 175,” Viktor initially punishes him. Over time, the men grow closer and see their relationship grow each time Hans gets thrown back into prison.

Do we really need another movie about a homophobe learning to love his local gay? No. The script by Sebastian Meise and Thomas Reider jostles between the 60s, 50s and 40s to chart their relationship in a non-linear structure. Oftentimes though, this structure confuses more than it illuminates. Thankfully, the story and perspective is centered around Hans and his experiences in jail. Franz Rogowski does an incredible job shading his performance. Even if it weren't for the makeup or title cards, we could easily figure out what timeline we were in thanks to his clearly defined performance. Under Rogowski, Hans isn’t a cowering mess, but instead owns his sexuality and his crime. His relationships with Oskar (Thomas Prenn) and Leo (Anton von Lucke) were both where the movie shines. Rogowski and Freidrich have great chemistry that overcomes some of the problematic elements of the setup.

The film builds to a fleeting exhale moment that is both glorious and troubling. Even though the road may be winding, it’s hard to deny the effectiveness of the film overall. B

Great Freedom will be playing on MUBI but no release date has been announced.

Citizen Ashe (Rex Miller, Sam Pollard)

Citizen Ashe is not about tennis. It’s about how Arthur Ashe used the privilege of his platform as a tennis star to be a civil rights activist. This distinction helps the documentary rise from a middle of the road sports documentary to something that examines the crossroads between sports and the quest for racial/social justice. Today, athletes like Colin Kapernick have reignited the tensions between politics and the broader sports community. Citizen Ashe shows how Arthur Ashe became the template for these current pioneering athletes.

Directors Rex Miller and Sam Pollard take a straightforward cradle to grave structure for the documentary. The passion for the subject clearly comes through. It’s hard not to be enamored with Arthur Ashe’s achievements on and off the court. For such a broad scope, a docuseries might have worked better. As it stands now, it feels like the information is a mile wide and a foot or two deep. Still, with what is presented, we still get a full picture of Arthur Ashe as a human. As evolved as he was on the issue of race, he had blind spots when it came to gender rights. This changed as he met his wife. It was fantastic that the documentary showed how he had to grow on some issues over time. 

One of the most interesting aspects of the documentary was Ashe’s feud with South Africa. He had initially got involved with opposing apartheid after hearing Nelson Mandela had been imprisoned. After being called “persona non grata” and having his visa denied three times, Ashe led a boycott of South African tennis tournaments. Even the tennis stadiums were segregated under apartheid. “Sports is a dramatic stage,” Ashe says at one point. This section illustrates this point the best. Ashe’s words had a global impact.

The final act of the documentary delves into Ashe’s AIDS diagnosis, due to a blood transfusion during his heart attack. His activism continued to the very end, fighting ignorance and stigma that came from having AIDS in the 80s. Arthur Ashe was more than just an athlete. This documentary serves as a great place to start learning about such an important tennis figure. B+

Citizen Ashe will be released on December 3rd, 2021 by Magnolia Pictures.

Comments

[thevoid99]

Arthur Ashe rules. I'm so glad there's a tennis stadium named after him as well as give AEW a place in New York City to tell WWE to go fuck themselves.

[eurocheese]

So happy the AFI Audience Award went to Jockey, and I was one of the voters giving it 5 stars. Clifford Collins Jr. giving one of the best performances of the year, and I'm so happy Molly Parker received a Gotham nomination for her moving work. The movie was a wonderful surprise for me. Everyone should see it!