3 stars out of 5
This is perhaps a 4-star movie for anyone too young to be aware of the Billie Jean King-Bobby Riggs match — especially girls and young women — or anyone who needs a refresher in equal rights now that we’re enduring Trump’s America. But judged simply as a film, I have to knock it down a notch.
In tone, it reminded me of The Founder, which I recently saw: soft-serve history, a little too light. And maybe it didn’t help that I’d just seen Ken Burns and Lynn Novick’s meticulously researched Vietnam War series, the end of which was set in the same time period. In comparison, Battle doesn’t feel like 1973; it’s as if the actors are playing dress-up.
The lead actors do an acceptable job. Emma Stone, who remains a favorite of mine, is solid as King. She captures both the confidence and also King’s bottled-up nature, especially regarding her sexual preference. Now, I don’t set out to give Steve Carell movies 3 stars, but he did set that standard with Dan in Real Life. He looks like Riggs and that helps. But for much of the film, we don’t get to see the wild side of Riggs’ personality; it’s more tell than show. (Along the same lines, there is some clunky dialogue, such as his wife Elisabeth Shue — also a favorite of mine — telling Riggs, “You’re a chauvinist and yet it is me who supports you.”) It’s only in the lead-up to the big match that Carell gets to cut loose and have some fun.
Carell may be one of those actors who needs a top-flight director to coax out a great performance, as in Foxcatcher. While I love that this film was directed by a man and a woman — Jonathan Dayton and Valerie Faris, best known for Little Miss Sunshine — they are not quite up to the task. As a result, Battle ends up having more of a TV-movie feel. Accordingly, the casting quality drops off quite a lot after Stone and Carell. Sarah Silverman, Chris Parnell, Fred Armisen, Tom Kenny, Tom Haverford’s girlfriend from Parks & Recreation: not exactly a murderers’ row.
Oh, one other thing that annoyed me. When you’re based on a true story, you’re allowed to gently massage certain facts. So why oh why are there two prominent characters named Jack and two prominent characters named Larry?
Billie Jean King is one of the greatest athletes ever and a true American hero. As I just heard in a rebroadcast Fresh Air interview, she’s still fighting the good fight 44 years later. So I think she deserves a slightly better movie.
Jack Silbert, curator