Stronger
2017
***
Director: David Gordon Green
Cast: Jake Gyllenhaal, Tatiana Maslany, Miranda Richardson, Clancy Brown, Frankie Shaw, Lenny Clarke, Richard Lane Jr., Patty O’Neil, Carlos Sanz, Danny McCarthy
Jeff Bauman loses both of his legs in the 2013 Boston Marathon bombing. As he undergoes physical rehabilitation and struggles with emotional trauma, he also faces the burden of becoming a public symbol of resilience. David Gordon Green’s drama explores strength and recovery but ends up as a quintessentially American story where survival is equated with heroism and celebrity. The performances, especially from Jake Gyllenhaal and Tatana Maslany, are great, yet the film is a difficult watch for the wrong reasons. Jeff spends most of the running time wallowing in self-pity, while his on-and-off girlfriend Erin moves in with him and his mother to witness his struggle around the clock. All of this seems overdramatised, particularly knowing that Jeff co-wrote his memoir with Bret Witter and published it only a year after the bombing.
