Concussion - C+

Quick Hit: The movie industry again dumbs down what could have been an excellent movie.

I don’t think it’s any secret that movies are consistently dumbed down. I’ve stated once or twice about my despise for the fact that movies now have everything connected and spelled out at the end of the movie, and praise movies that allow an audience to actually *gasp* think for themselves. That leads me into today’s movie, which actually has to do with the brain as well: Concussion.

Will Smith stars in this movie about the doctor that discovered CTE (Chronic Traumatic Encephalopathy). Essentially, this is what this movie is presented as. We don’t really get to go into anything else. It’s a shame, because this movie has some really interesting turns it could have made, and instead, it chose the easy way out.

For instance, let’s look at the plot of this film. Doctor Omalu is working as a coroner in Pittsburgh. He treats his “patients” with respect, refusing to reuse the same knives on different bodies. Eventually, the body of a retired football star shows up on his table, and the questions begin. Why was a healthy man living on the street, doing drugs, and hurting himself? This leads him to finance brain testing and eventually leads him to the discovery that the man’s brain is as deteriorated as that of an Alzheimer’s sufferer.

The scenes where Smith is allowed to perform are excellent. He nails the Nigerian accent without ever forcing it, which is 

Case in point boys and girls - if it's on the label, follow directions.

something that even different actors in this movie have trouble with (I’m looking at you Alec Baldwin). All the scenes with Smith as a doctor are terrific, and he throws out terms and medical jargon with ease: even better, he makes them understandable without making it seem dumbed down. However, the most powerful scenes aren’t necessarily with its stars, but with the beat players.

Though the stars help quite a bit.

Throughout the film, we visit many ex-football players in their current lives. These scenes are extremely emotional, because we are treated to clips of the players excelling on the field as well. To see someone that is so dominant in a game stumble around and be unable to articulate what they are trying to say is unnerving. Then to find out that these characters are killed (or some even kill themselves) can truly shake you. I think the most brilliant tactic was using the commentary of “big hits” and splicing it to the little league football. It makes you wonder and think about all the damage these young children are doing to their brains.

However, despite the fact that up until this point I have been largely positive, the movie is kinda like my review: halfway through it falls apart. We could have been treated to continued medical science, but instead we figure that it’s all good enough. We could have explored what it is like to be ousted by 

society, pushed into near exile: instead we get a weird chase scene that eventually leads (maybe, the movie is unclear) to a miscarriage. We get a raid that may or may not be caused by the NFL. And then suddenly, we get the ending.

​This is sloppy. This is unfortunate. Another Will Smith

oh I'm telling it.

performance has gone to waste. I won’t say that the movie was perfect up to this point (the scenes where the relationship between Omalu and his wife are explored seem extremely forced, despite good performances) (and they completely kill the momentum of the main story), but it was trending in a very positive direction. Unfortunately, the inability to tell a compelling story continues to be the bane of highly marketed movies.

I’m going to give Concussion a “C+”.

Check out more on this movie at IMDB.