This movie focuses on the famous rivalry between the placid Björn Borg and the volatile John McEnroe at the 1980 Wimbledon Championships, culminating in their encounter in the men's singles final.
What we're left with is a staid little movie that races around the court and rallies itself to exhaustion, a historical drama that enshrines the narrative underpinnings of all great sports stories without doing anything to upend them.
Surprisingly sombre in tone, Metz's debut scripted feature film ambitiously delves into the psychology of these two men, and that of elite sportspeople in general ... Borg's crisis of confidence and McEnroe's arrogance result in two unlikeable leads.
Though it never justifies the overblown Andre Agassi quote used as its preface ("every match is a life in miniature"), the picture certainly shows how a single match can be made to feel like the world depends on it.
McEnroe's "unsportsmanlike behaviour" is a no-brainer fit for LaBeouf, who attacks the tennis enfant terrible's profanity-filled, racket-throwing antics with gusto.
Fails to turn its title characters into three-dimensional people, leaning into their public personas instead of sketching in the details that would make them feel genuine.
