One of Maguire's finer performances

Rating: 6/10 (24 December 2015)

Is playing a crazy person easy? Because these sort of films where the lead propagandist usually get a lot of critical acclaim because the actor played a crazy person really well. And thats what this is. Its an interesting story about how the media and mediocrity can turn sports into a vessel of patriotism for the middle class. A sports as dull as chess nonetheless. Maguire usually plays innocent polite characters and I was pleasantly surprised by how well he played a rude egoistic sob. The matches shown were surprisingly exciting and Maguire's quirks were so believable that you become irritated by them. The director Edward Zwick has done some masterpieces in the past like The Last Samurai and Blood Diamond. This one unfortunately doesn't even come close to those. I wouldn't recommend this if you are really looking for some entertainment, but if you have limited options then probability is, this might not be the worst one.