'Race' Movie Review

Hello, fellow moviegoers!
   Once upon a time, biopics based upon major historical figures were always huge successes. However, over the past few years, this trend has started to decline. Recently, films such as 42, Love and Mercy, and The Danish Girl, were all critically acclaimed. Yet, they failed to excel at the box office. Even films based upon more recent celebrities such as both of the Steve Jobs films have failed to crack even $40 million worldwide. While these films may not be as successful as they used to be, Hollywood still churns them out relentlessly.
    Race is the true story based upon American-Athlete Jesse Owens. He was an African-American track star that was breaking records during a time of racial dispute in the U.S. Not only that, but he competed in the 1936 Olympics that took place in Nazi Germany. So does Race manage to stand out among a plethora of other biopics?

   Race is a good movie. It’s well acted, it’s written and directed well, and the actual races in the film got your heart pumping a bit. But, Race fails to be fantastic. In fact, I would even hesitate to call it great. It’s a by-the-books biopic that we’ve come to expect every few years or so. It comes and goes and nobody seems to notice. 
    Let’s start with the acting. All of the actors in this film suited their roles well. However, none of them stood out as being fantastic. They were all very serviceable in their roles. I would like to point out that it was nice to see Jason Sudeikis step out of his comedic shell. It’s always interesting when comedic actors decide to stretch their legs a bit and do a drama or two. Sometimes is works fantastically, as in Steve Carell’s case. Other times, not so much.
    The writing in this film was a little here and there. Some scenes were a bit boring because the dialogue that was written wasn’t really that interesting. Then there are other scenes that worked extremely well and would’ve been an emotional train wreck to the audience, had we been more invested. That brings us to the biggest flaw, you never really care about the characters. Yeah, you can see that they’re good people, but you never actually want to sit down and hang out with them. You don’t want to interact with these people because they seem a bit boring. So, when you don’t care about the characters, these would-be emotional train wrecks don’t pack as big of a punch as they had the potential to.
   The scenes of Jesse Owens running, however, were really exciting. You actually were interested in who was going to win and who wasn’t. You breathed a sigh of relief whenever they would prevail. The thing about that is, with a film like this, you’re supposed to be standing up and cheering in those moments. Because the races and jumps don’t last long, you never really develop the level of nervousness as you’re supposed to. So, while the races were exciting, they were very short lived.
   Race is the type of movie that you watch in a High School history course. It keeps the class’s attention, but it doesn’t necessarily make the class exciting either. It is decently acted and directed, and the races are fun, but they don’t last long enough for you to actually care about them. I would recommend you watch Race if you’re a history buff, or if you really don’t have anything else to do this weekend.
6/10

So what did you think of Race? Did you enjoy it more or less than I did? Let me know by commenting on this post! Also, if you enjoyed this review, share it on Facebook and Twitter. It really helps! Don’t forget, I post every Monday, Wednesday, and Friday, so check back then for more movie reviews and other miscellaneous movie thoughts.
​
Thanks for stopping by!