Just when I was beginning to lose hope when it comes to Hollywood's disturbing penchant for seeing black characters as victims, Race comes along.

| Sep 29, 2021

Race is a long overdue film about Jesse Owens with excellent performances and a thoughtful portrayal of documentarian/propagandist Leni Riefenstahl.

| Sep 29, 2021

Race isn't a bad film or biopic for that matter. It's beautifully shot, informative, and has some fantastic actors helming it. However, that's exactly what you'd expect.

| Apr 12, 2017

The film is woefully disjointed, frustratingly removed from its lead character, and overly sanitized.

| Original Score: C | Mar 21, 2017

ace is a history lesson, personal profile and a crowd pleaser.

| Nov 8, 2016

Race means well, and it certainly wants to tell Owens' story as completely as it can. Yet Hopkins and company never quite get there, the whole enterprise coming up a little short of the finish line as it lumbers its way down the track.

| Original Score: 2/4 | Aug 15, 2016

Race is a classic underdog sports movie.

| Original Score: 3/5 | Aug 9, 2016

Race attempts to tell two stories: about the life of Jesse Owens and the relationship between the US and Germany. Neither receives the attention it deserves.

| Original Score: 2.5/5 | Aug 2, 2016

The simplistic approach means that the film might work best for family audiences as an entry-level introduction to the history of racial politics.

| Original Score: 2/5 | Jun 5, 2016

As a primer on Owens's life and achievements, the film works well enough. As a drama about race, politics, changing social attitudes and the winds of war, it is a non-starter.

| Original Score: 4/5 | Jun 3, 2016

Hopkins wants us to believe that the unifying power of sport can overcome the divisiveness of politics, and so he places all subtlety to the side to force this sentimental notion down our throats.

| Original Score: 2/5 | Jun 3, 2016

That it remains broadly watchable owes much to James's lean, committed turn, but what's around him often seems to be carving its lightning-bolt history into not stone but easily digestible cheese.

| Original Score: 3/5 | Jun 2, 2016

Every sports film needs some solid opposition to raise the stakes. How about the entire Third Reich?

| Original Score: 3/5 | Jun 2, 2016

It's an important story about a groundbreaking African American, and it's disappointing to see it reframed, by its (white) director and (white) screenwriters, as a film that's just as much about the white people around him

| Apr 27, 2016

The tension of the competition, usually the staple of sporting films, is sorely missing. You don't get a sense of the rigour of Owens' training and the enormity of his achievement, which is otherwise so well documented.

| Apr 15, 2016

Jesse Owens was a runner -- but that doesn't mean Race should run away from his story. Sadly, that's exactly what the new biopic about the track star does.

| Original Score: 2/5 | Feb 26, 2016

A glossy, superficial biopic set in a historical context that begs for more, Race can at least claim to be one of the two best movies ever made about Olympic hero/Hitler-embarrasser Jesse Owens.

| Original Score: 3.5/5 | Feb 23, 2016

A wallpaper-thin but sentimentally effective hagiography.

| Feb 22, 2016

Race is the most timid, lackadaisical movie that could have been made out of potentially classic material.

| Original Score: 2/5 | Feb 19, 2016

'Race' is mostly a film that recounts Owens' achievements. It's not a human representation of his experience.

| Original Score: 2/5 | Feb 19, 2016