Time To Get With "The Program"

The Program (2015)

Rated R

Starring Ben Foster, Chris O'Dowd, Dustin Hoffman, Lee Pace, Jesse Plemons,

Directed by Stephen Frears

The Story:

David Walsh (O'Dowd) is a reporter for an Irish newspaper who has been covering the Tour de France for years. When he sees his colleagues become enamored with previously not-that-great cyclist Lance Armstrong (Foster), he expresses his doubts. The more Armstrong begins winning, the more sure Walsh is that he's cheating.

This is based on the book that Walsh wrote on Lance Armstrong doping, and duping, the entire world.

And it's a good movie, but it's not great.

It unfolds in a straightforward fashion with Lance not being very great on the hills of France and then slowly, methodically, he works his way to the top of the mountain, both figuratively and literally.

Foster is an amazing Lance Armstrong, the guy that everyone loved once upon a time.

The American that beat The Tour!
The American that beat Cancer!

Then he got greedy and had to come back for more.

And that's when things began to unravel.

Had he simply stayed away from the limelight, it's quite possible that his legacy would have endured.

But the ego, the need for the spotlight shines through in his performance, and you can see it as his true undoing.

O'Dowd makes for a great reporter, going after the story that nobody else wants to believe.

The weird thing, for a story that involves his work to uncover the story, the reporter is absent for most of the proceedings, which is a shame.

It seemed like the story was missing the dramatic cues that allow Armstrong to stay one step ahead for so long, or perhaps it's just knowing what happens, there's never a sense of real drama or tension to elevate this film from a "should see" to a "must see".

Now streaming on Amazon Prime as of this writing.

Final Grade:  B-