I really liked this movie. It's not nearly as good as it tries to be, but it does several things that I think deserve a lot more attention than they're getting.
First let's start with the basics. This is a melodramatic biography film that centers on the life work of one Dr. Bennet Omalu, a Nigerian-born forensic pathologist who researched brain trauma in football players and fought the NFL's efforts to silence him. Of course, all this is based on reality, and I can't say much about the factual basis for any of this, because I don't football.
Concussion, though perhaps misnamed, focuses on the efforts of Dr. Omalu and the effects of his fame/infamy on his personal life. Will Smith. Yes, Will Smith -- and I can't believe I'm saying this -- gives an amazing performance. Sure, maybe his accent falters here and there, ringing a little thin when it counts (not unlike Chris Hemsworth's faulty Nantucket effort), but it doesn't take long before you realize that the character's accent is one of the least important things in this movie. Smith imbues his eccentric character with idiosyncrasies and nuances that left me speechless, only to then add layer upon layer of unbridled passion and compassion. He captures first your attention and then your heart, and he carries the film with grace and finesse. Bravo.
A few other high points, shall we? David Morse delivers a heartrending performance as Mike Webster, a tragedy of the sport who incites the main plot when he dies in disgrace at only 50 years of age. Our protagonist uses Webster's fame and fans to repeatedly declare that football is killing people, even as the memory of Webster remains fresh and vivid in his psyche.
And then, of course, there are my favorite elements of the film. Though it is structured as a typical sports drama, its primary antagonists come from the highest levels of the sport in question. The NFL is presented as a sort of ubiquitous, monolithic Goliath, while our hero-David is a doctor. A foreign doctor. Who speaks differently. Who acts differently. This isn't another "Oh, he's black, but he's the same as us, I get it" discussion. This is a "Oh, he's not American, but he's in America and he's trying to destroy an American institution, but he's smart and kind and right" discussion. Timely? Hell yes. I love the little moment when Dr. Omalu's comrade says that he'll be an American hero: But you're not even American? Even better. (I should note that the often-repeated use of the identifier "American" is a little overkill, but it's not as bad as certain other words we might hear in theaters this week).
The supporting actors are all solid, no question there. But the plot suffers from being a little too unspecific. It seems that, in trying to be sweeping and grand, the film loses some of its footing and begins to tumble in a chilly Pittsburgh breeze. And it falls into a few shallow pitfalls of the genre, namely toying with a thriller-genre subplot, such as when Omalu's pregnant wife Prema attempts to evade a car seemingly tailing her, or when their phone rings with (presumably) yet another hate-call and the lights dramatically shift and they look at each other like the killer's in the attic. I get why the filmmakers included these bits, but it takes away from the face-to-face drama when Smith's character confronts his adversaries.
It feels a little weird, seeing this movie in the last stretch of Oscar season, but then this Oscar season is just generally weird. It started too early, it's ending too late, and there was a lot of trash in the mix. As far as Concussion goes, it's a melodrama, for better and for worse. It's a streamlined, straightforward story, and it tries to be more artful and important than it is. But it's also timely and daring, two qualities I would not expect from a "sports drama", though I'm not sure that's even an accurate descriptor here. It's a feel-good movie, and yet ultimately it left me feeling worse (which is not a bad thing here!). Because this problem is happening now. Because the wealthy owners and the quasi-religious spectators are so fervently determined to let the game go on that they don't care about murder. Because, overblown as it may sound, we in 2016 America enjoy throwing our strongest men into arenas to attack each other while we watch and cheer. Because we enjoy watching heroes get "jacked up", and we ridicule them when they stumble, and we forget about them as they die.
Even as Dr. Omalu celebrates his victory, he sees young kids playing football on a field. And he knows that he will continue to perform autopsies on those battered bodies that America tosses aside.
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