FYC: Ben Affleck, The Way Back
Tuesday, February 23, 2021 at 11:00AM By: Patrick Gratton
Has anyone set flame to their post Oscar goodwill as quickly as Ben Affleck? And he did it not once but twice! The eternal comeback kid, Affleck has been lunging forward and falling back in and out of the public and critical favor for the larger part of his career. Bouncing back and forth, whether it be his “Hollywood’s new leading man” phase, his Gigli-tabloid fodder phase, his Affleckassance directorial efforts, his Batfleck phase and the Sadffleck meme, Affleck has continuously struggled to maintain a second act in his career. In retrospect, through baggage-induced trial and error, Affleck has built a career of rising above lowered expectations, only to fall again.
After a career's worth of trying to fit the bill that Hollywood gave him, it shouldn’t be a surprise that he wears 'rundown & disgruntled' so well in Gavin O’Connor’s The Way Back...
The third of O’Connors sport centric dramas, The Way Back finds Affleck playing Jack Cunningham, a drunkard construction worker who gets roped into coaching the Bridget Hayes High School varsity basketball team, after the team’s previous coach suffers a heart attack. Following the tried and true formula of underdog sport stories, Bridget Hayes hasn’t made the basketball playoffs since Jack was a high school bball star, but he and his band of misfit teens will attempt to defy the odds while he faces his demons head-on.
The film opens with Jack at a construction work site, building the foundation of a skyscraper, rigging lumber up the building’s base, cutting up rebar before tying the pieces up together with tie wire. It’s humbling but thankless work, Eduard Grau’s camera juxtaposes Jack’s solemn emptiness against the backdrop of the bright Californian sky. The end of the work day bell rings. Jack pours himself a beer for the road before stopping at his local watering hole on his way home. This is Jack’s daily routine, who after the passing of his son, has found his life at a standstill. He’s separated from his wife Angela (Janina Gavankar), estranged from his family, and has disengaged with life in general. Closing himself off from the world, Jack has spiraled down a web of self-pity, losing the will to carry on, while barking at those who question his endurance at this stage of his life.
By design, sports films are shaped as star vehicles, whether centering around the team's coach or star player. The Walt Disney Company laid the groundwork for the prototypical “father-knows-best” type coach who raises a team of underdogs to athletic success in the early aughts, like Boaz Yakin’s Remember the Titans or O’Connor’s own Miracle on Ice biopic Miracle. Likewise, The Way Back hinges on Affleck’s shoulders, only without the inspirational father-knows-best trappings. You might be surprised by how far the film strays from the sports film formula: how little time is spent on the court, how its wayward team of players are so thinly written, how the film’s third act has so little use for the team’s basketball playoffs and how Cunningham makes for a resilient coach.
It’s this resilience that defines Cunningham, who like a pendulum swinging, never misses a beat. For every moment where Jack makes good on his promise to do right by his players, a subsequent self-destructive bender soon follows. It’s clear that Jack sees the court as a way to escape his demons ,there’s a twinkle in Affleck’s eyes whenever Jack dons the cape of a misanthropic courtside coach. But there’s no love or duty in Jack’s coaching style, often confusing his self interest for his devotion to the boys he’s supposed to be mentoring. His style of coaching normally means critiques which go for the team’s jugular, raging on the sidelines, projecting his failings onto his players.
Affleck has never been this angry, nor has he ever looked so defeated on screen before. There’s an exhaustion that permeates Affleck’s performance, as if his bearish physique is constantly on the verge of collapsing. His once-square jaw is now swollen, drowning in the aftermath of drinking himself to sleep. Affleck’s lack of physical composure, often stumbling or erratic, feels lived in, giving way to the character’s whittled state. Affleck uses his physicality, not as proof of brawny strength, but as a grizzly shell where Jack hides himself from the world. There’s an early scene in the film where Angela meets with Jack to admit that she’s dating again. Watch how Affleck reacts to the news, the blow knocking down Jack’s walls, Jack’s demeanor shifting to reveal the smallest man in the world.
Much has already been written about how Affleck’s real life time in rehab mirrored and informed the character, with Affleck’s stint in 2018 almost forcing Warner Bros to pull the plug on the film. Clearly art imitated his life, and this isn’t the first time for Affleck. The actor also received precursor support for his supporting role in Allen Coulter’s gumshoe potboiler Hollywoodland. In the film, Affleck played George Reeves, the matinee idol who played Superman in the 1950s Saturday morning serial The Adventure of Superman. Beyond the mere fact that both Affleck and Reeves donned tights playing superheroes, Reeves’ malaise of being typecast, chewed up and eventually spit out by the Hollywood machine, drew parallels to Affleck's own career at the time. In the wake of the Gigli extravaganza, Affleck found his career on the verge of being sidelined, viewed more as a tabloid celebrity than a talented actor, a far cry from his days as breakout supporting player in the house of Miramax. Affleck channeled his personal resentment of being written off into the role of Reeves, bringing pathos to a role that, as written, was murky at best and one-note at worst.
Putting the marriage of actor and character aside for a second, The Way Back shows Affleck's growth as a performer. Gone are his arsenal of acting techniques that plagued his career: his transparent smile, his need to court favor, the disingenuous disarming of his audience and the overzealous attempts at seeking vindication and redemption. In other words, there’s a calmness to Affleck’s performance, as if his rocky career has finally lifted the weight of being likeable off his shoulders. Jack Cunningham makes for a poignant spiritual successor to George Reeves, two sides of the same coin. The latter reflecting a man still in the throes of self-definition, while the former the spiteful resignations of the shortcoming of the roads taken.
Affleck may have just given his career culminating performance wih The Way Back. His jadedness not only speaks to Cunningham’s sorrow, but to Affleck’s torments as a public figure. Who knew that Affleck only had to grow out his beard to emulate the pathos he’s always been striving for? With the performance Affleck returns to his lower class roots after a career of playing dress-up. Rather than donning suits and capes, he now wears suspenders, a hard hat and joggers. This is also a return for my roots as well. In my first piece for this site, I wrote about Affleck’s real life childhood friend Matt Damon. On the subject of Damon, I wrote “The problem with Hollywood’s original assessment of Damon, a miscalculation as it were, is that Damon is not a leading man. Or he isn’t the leading man in the mold Hollywood tried to shape him up to be.” I believe the same is true for Affleck. Hollywood, after decades worth of aimlessly throwing darts to the board, still hasn’t figured out an opportune way to capitalize on his strengths. No, Affleck is still finessing his career’s second act, and after trial and error, confronting and exorcising his demons, The Way Back might be the fine tuning that unlocks the next chapter.
Ben Affleck, Best Actor, FYC, The Way Back, booze, sports
Reader Comments (26)
He has two undeserved Oscars as is. Stop encouraging the Academy to acknowledge him again.
This is a great FYC. Despite all the great performances, I love Affleck in this film. I actually hope he sneaks in the final five.
Good Will Hunting is a worthy script.
Argo very good tho not film of the year. Let's not hate too hard.
No no no. The best actor line up is tied up as it is with truly great performances so that even Ben Adir and others will be left out. Affleck does not need to be part of this conversation. Like the above poster stated , he has an undeserved Oscar already.
Like so many others, he feels like he's being graded on his own curve. If a consistently competent actor turned in this performance, would it generate awards talk in a year this stacked?
He'd make my top 5 this year. Of those in serious discussion, I think he's better than Oldman and Hanks, so no, I don't think he's been graded on a curve. Have not yet seen Minari and Father yet.
This was the last film I saw in theaters before COVID19 happened and everything shut down.
From what I remember of it, Affleck was quite good.
It plays like a Hoosiers remake with Ben instead of Gene and Ben rises to the challenge well,his performance reminded of Jake Gyllenhaal in Stronger,if Tom Cruise was giving this performance the Academy would fall over themselves to give him the win.
I read it with pleasure. People tend to dismiss Affleck but this is actually a good performance and in any other year would be more present in the predictions. I think the magnificent five will be chosen between Boseman, Hopkins, Oldman, Ahmed, Yuen and Lindo (my personal favourite Mads Mikkelsen will have to be satisfied in being the Best International Film frontrunner leading man), still thank you for your FYC
@markgordonuk
The idea of 5-7 Tom Cruise being a high school basketball star makes me giddy with laughter
Agreed with #Me - Good Will Hunting is a fabulous script !! And we all loved the historic story of the 2 young unknown actors writing their own stuff as they didn't get any meaty parts... and ended up with gold. So I bow down to both careers - Affleck is not so easy to cast - as he appears to be a bit wooden - which he is not ... I also think he is better then Hanks & Oldman this year - but not up for the 5th spot ... as I would rather see Ben-Adair's fascinating performance recognised.
The thing with Affleck is, he's utterly bland. If he weren't an attractive straight white man, his career would have been over years ago.
"Affleckassance": that hurt my ears just reading it.
His a far better producer and director than he is an actor. I wish he would do more of that.
This is a fine performance for an Emmy in the early 2000s. In this year, there's not much of a case for him to be nominated.
Affleck's second act should be for directing. Get that elusive director Oscar (well, the nomination first lol) and call acting a wrap already.
Oscar loves come backs
Benaissance is perfect
I dont share Patrick's devotion to this performance but i do think he's really good in it so loved reading it (he's in my top 12 this year if not the top 5)
After all we've been though last year, do we really need a post singing praises to Ben Affleck as an actor? I mean, does he need it?
Affleck represents - not his fault - everything that is wrong with Hollywood and its old habit of rewarding mediocre white men for being merely competent. Say what you will about Affleck, but the guy is not an artist. He's just a large cog in the machine. Everything he's ever done is devoid of artistry, his work as a director included. I swear I'm just not hating on the guy. I wish him the best. He's just crashing the party here in this website which is supposed to celebrate art.
I loved his performance, and was hoping that he and Elisabeth Moss for The Invisible Man would be in the conversation, since they did actually make it onto the Big Screen before it all came tumbling down.
He definitely worked with his own life on this character, and it worked very well. Haven't seen all of them, but only Delroy Lindo has given a better performance this ysear.
I like Ben Affleck. Yeah, he had a period where he was easily-mocked but he came back from it and proved to be a pretty good director and a pretty good actor. The good stuff he's been doing makes me forgive him for his work with Michael Bay and Gigli.
Oh please, just NO.
Affleck is eye candy at best but e very, very limited actor (good director though).
I'd rather see Leto happening.
Haven't seen this because I really hated Gavin O'Connor's WARRIOR and this sort of looks similar, but I liked Affleck in HOLLYWOODLAND which seems like a comparable role so maybe I should on a Friday night when the desire for something mainstream and Hollywood is at its peak. Lord knows the studip has been FYCing him to kingdom come, although if even the Golden Globes wouldn't go for him, I don't imagine the Academy will...
I have not seen the movie (although I probably have - multiple times with different actors), but I find Affleck's career fascinating. He is not the best actor, he's merely a competent director, and yet he's been a star for 20 years or more. Buzzfeed had a very interesting article about his career couple years ago, analyzing it through the lens of social class:
https://www.buzzfeednews.com/article/annehelenpetersen/shame-of-sadfleck
I do agree Affleck is bland, but that's a matter of being a leading man. In character roles, he's much better. Was great in Changing Lanes as a co-lead, controlled. And in Good Will Hunting he's perfect. But he's not an outright leading man (Matt Damon is, despite the suggestion otherwise).
He's quite good behind the camera. More than competent.
Affleck ı love you