‘Air’ Review

Stars: Ben Affleck, Matt Damon, Chris Tucker, Viola Davis, Jason Bateman, Chris Messina, Julius Tennon, Matthew Maher, Jay Mohr, Marlon Wayans | Written by Alex Convery | Directed by Ben Affleck

The past decade or so has been littered with true story films, that show business and brands coming to be. Most famously, we’ve had The Social Network, but we’ve also had films like The Founder, and even currently have films like Tetris hitting our screens. Air is not on the level of The Social Network – although most films aren’t – it is however, an entertaining film that tells the story of the board room meetings and sales pitches that led Nike to sign the most famous basketball player of all time.

Ben Affleck is once again behind the camera as director, and in front of it as Phil Knight, the CEO of Nike. In an instance, we are reminded of Affleck’s fantastic direction that sets the film off at an exciting pace, a pace that pushes you through what could have been a boring talkie, set in boardroom after boardroom. Strangely enough, he’s managed to give us that thrilling energy he created in his 2012 best picture winner Argo and applies it here. Going in, it was never the energy or style I expected but surprisingly it worked so well in this dramatic re-telling of events. The energy helps set the stakes higher, in a story pretty much everyone going in will already know the outcome of. Affleck creates the same ‘race against the clock’ tension he had in the final act of Argo, but the stakes aren’t as high, as Nike’s rivals, Adidas and Converse, look set to sign the NBA legend before Nike can even get a meeting with him.

Opposite Affleck on screen, in the films leading role, is the man he wrote Good Will Hunting with, Matt Damon. Damon plays Sonny Vaccaro, the man who knows everything there is to know about basketball, and who is hired by Nike to find the next best players to sponsor. However, Sonny has been struggling to find the star Nike need to set their basketball department alight. The pressure only increases as their rivals sign up all the best talent leaving Sonny to put all his chips into the pursuit of rookie Michael Jordan. Both Affleck and Damon are great on screen and the scenes they share together remind us why their chemistry has always been so good. They get each other’s timings and create some fast-paced and funny scenes that had more laughs than some recent comedies had in their whole movies. Chris Tucker’s involvement also helped with the laughs and his performance channelled the perfect amount of his comedic timing, leaving enough room to show us his dramatic side and create a really great supporting role. The rest of the supporting cast are all great too with Viola Davis once again standing out from the rest. She plays Deloris Jordan, Michael Jordan’s mother, and no doubt gives the best performance in the film. In fact, for the last ten years Viola Davis has perhaps been the most consistent actor in Hollywood. No matter the role or the film she always gives an incredible performance that results in her being the film’s standout. If Meryl Streep is going to get an Oscar notation every time she plays a half-decent supporting role then Davis should have one for every film she’s in.

The obvious omission here is Jordan himself – which the film decides to never show or reveal him, he’s always hidden by blocking, or a well-placed over-the-shoulder shot. It’s a decision I ended up liking, the film is never truly about him as a man but as the idea he represents. It’s the idea of what getting him into the shoe represents to the marketing and sales of said shoe. The film isn’t about Michael Jordan the star, or player, as that’s a story known to millions, instead it is a story about what he represents as a piece of marketing to a brand, and how that led to athletes profiting off their name as well as the companies profiting. It is also about the idea of him being larger than life – we all know he’s a superstar, so the mention of his name alone lets us know how big this deal is and everything it represents. So, we don’t need to see an actor play Jordan to establish any of that, if anything no one can play an idea that large. Affleck himself has said the idea of not showing Jordan was because of how big he is, and how famous. Everyone knows the name and I imagine everyone in America at least knows what he looks like, Affleck believed showing someone who wasn’t Michael Jordan himself would take people out of the film and make them think what they were seeing was fake. I can see how that idea works and what that represents. For me, it felt like a smart decision and something that never took me away from the film’s main themes and ideas.

In the end, Air joins a category of films like Moneyball, The Big Short, The Founder, The Social Network, and many more. Films that tell true stories in exciting ways, all of which are entertaining and some of which that are genuinely brilliant films. Air falls somewhere closer to the entertaining film than the brilliant and will act as a perfect watch to keep you entertained. With great performances, directing, and writing, it made me care about something I never thought I’d ever even have a second thought about.

**** 4/5

Air is in cinemas now.