CONCUSSION

3.5 stars (out of 5)

Another factually-based drama from writer/director Peter Landesman (whose underrated JFK assassination pic Parkland is worth seeking out), this Oscar-baiting epic might fill some with dread as it looks distinctly like it might be yet another Sports Movie – and an American Sports Movie at that (eeeeeeeeeeekkk!!!). However, Landesman’s film (drawn in part from Jeanne Marie Laskas’ GQ article Game Brain) is less about grid iron and more about the characters, a central mystery, a good man fighting for what’s right against a deeply corrupt system and, just quietly, a study of what it is to be American.

Dr Bennet Omalu (Will Smith with an impressive accent) is a hugely accomplished Nigerian forensic pathologist living in Pittsburgh in 2002 and much-respected by boss Dr Cyril Wecht (Albert Brooks) despite his odd ways, such as talking to the dead as he performs autopsies. When he meets the corpse of Pittsburgh Steelers player Mike Webster (David Morse), who introduces the film in a recreation of his 1997 Hall Of Fame speech and is soon after living in a car and huffing super glue before a cardiac arrest kills him, Omalu is told by friends and admirers to leave the body alone as it was just a heart attack.

However, the ever-inquisitive Bennet suspects something else took Webster’s life, and when he investigates further (at his own expense), he discovers that more than a few pro footballers suffer (like boxers) from dementia pugilistica (or chronic traumatic encephalopathy or CTE), and his findings are published in Neurosurgery with Wecht and Dr Steven DeKosky (English actor Eddie Marsan). And this looks set to be his downfall, as the NFL doesn’t appreciate the suggestion that they knowingly let their players develop brain damage, and despite the valuable assistance of former team doctor Julian Bailes (Alec Baldwin), the smear campaign begins, and it’s a particularly nasty one. Especially as Omalu isn’t, you know, from America.

Smith’s quietly tough performance gives Concussion its heart, and he isn’t afraid to show that Omalu is a man that could drive you mad with his niggling eye for detail and his irrepressible curiosity (but you need those to earn eight tertiary degrees). And he’s strongly supported by Gugu Mbatha-Raw (another Brit as Prema Mutiso, whom Omalu understandably falls for), Morse, Baldwin, Marsan, Brooks and many others, all working to make Landesman’s script seem real and ensuring that this hits as hard as possible (WHACK!!!).