Sundance Movie Review: Provocative Drama 'Fair Play' Is Best Of Fest So Far
Admin
3 Feb, 2023
1/5
Emily (Phoebe Dynevor) catches the eye of Luke (Alden Ehrenreich). Photo courtesy of the Sundance Institute
Jan. 24 (UPI) --"Fair Game," which premiered Friday at the Sundance Film Festival, made a strong impression in the first half of the festival. It's an exciting drama that's been talked about a lot, so it's sure to cause controversy among audiences who will react differently.
Luke (Elden Ehrenreich) and Emily (Phoebe Dynevor) work as analysts at a financial firm. They thought their biggest problem was telling the company they were dating and engaged until Emily got the promotion Luke was waiting for.
This level of fair play is certainly sufficient for many comments, but this is one of them. Emily's advances reveal Luke's toxic masculinity, which sealed her fate.
Luke's first question when he breaks the good news to Emily is if his boss Campbell (Eddie Marsa) has tried anything sexual. He asked more than once because it was the only way to explain the woman's advances.
Emily tries to get Luke more work as an analyst to prepare him for a promotion, but he is not very good at his job. Luke's selection cost the company millions of dollars, and Campbell actually expected him to quit, not be fired.
Finance is a good background for this story because the data is completely foreign to the general audience the brief is aimed at. Emily is definitely better at picking stocks.
Luke jumped on the bandwagon not really knowing about the company. He doubled down on bad ideas and never looked inward to see why he was ignoring what other colleagues were seeing.
Luke is the slow-motion train wreck that everyone—Emily, the audience, Campbell—is waiting for, but he's only guiding them toward the inevitable crash. Not only was he burdening Emily, he was encouraging her to love someone who must inevitably self-destruct.
Emily is committed to following the male culture of her other corporate colleagues. Whether he should or not is up for debate, but Luke clearly feels left out.
Writer/director Chloe Domont boils this firebox and explodes, deepening the stress and chaos of a career with family expectations and obligations. Emily makes some decisions that challenge the audience, but she returns to Luke anyway.
Luke's toxic masculinity makes him believe that he's entitled to succeed, that he's inherently competent when given the chance to try and mess him up. Instead of learning from her, she looks for reasons why Campbell values Emily more.
Lucas forces Emily to surrender. If he just says "I'm sorry I didn't support you enough" or "I'm sorry I missed the opportunity you gave me" or apologizes for whatever, we'll make it so they can work together.
Lack of humility inevitably leads to destruction. And that's just one of the interesting topics Dumont explores in Fair Game .
Netflix will release Fair Play after Sundance.
Fred Topel, who attended Ithaca College's film school, is a Los Angeles-based entertainment writer for UPI. He has been a professional film critic since 1999, a Rotten Tomatoes critic since 2001, and a member of the Television Critics Association since 2012. Learn more about his work at Entertainment.
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