At Rock Bottom, a Man is Given Another Chance to Aim High

Ben Affleck in "The Way Back"
Photo Credit: Imdb.com

One of director Gavin O’Connor’s talents is taking a movie that could falter from its clichés, but manages to make them into emotional dramas that keep us invested.  He accomplished this with his sports films, 2004’s “Miracle” and 2011’s “Warrior,” where he brought us characters whose desire for greatness and redemption helped elevate their stories above the more-familiar aspects.

O’Connor accomplishes this once again with his sports drama, “The Way Back,” a movie that rises above a well-known premise to deliver a powerfully acted story of recovery that’s led by a hard-hitting performance from its star.

Jack Cunningham (Ben Affleck) is a construction worker who suffers from alcoholism.  One day, he’s approached by his former high school to be a replacement for their basketball coach.  Having been a star player as a student, he takes on the position and does what he can to improve the team.  While doing so, Jack will also come to face to face with the demons that have taken over his life.

Affleck, who was the lead in O’Connor’s 2016 thriller, “The Accountant,” has been open about his alcohol addiction, and knowing this part of his history offers a whole other dimension to his performance.  With this background information, we understand from where the rawness of Affleck’s portrayal comes.  This is a role in which Affleck bares his soul, using this as a way to reveal to the audience an idea of what it was like to go through his real-life hardships.  He offers a superb ability to alternate between moments of calmness and moments of emotional aggression, showing the turbulence that’s always wearing him down.  When his character coaches the team, Affleck exhibits the sense of passion that Jack once had for the sport, becoming enthusiastic about the different plays.  As this occurs, Jack instills a sense of responsibility on the players, displaying how much he cares for them and wants them to succeed, thereby showing the new sense of responsibility that’s been placed upon him, making us hope that he will continue on this path.  Despite Jack being a character that we’ve seen several times before, Affleck instills so much strength into his role that he imbues this archetype with a deep-rooted invigoration that makes his character’s journey towards a recovery so compelling.

Working alongside Affleck is a superb supporting cast that includes Al Madrigal as Jack’s assistant coach, Dan; Michaela Watkins as Jack’s sister, Beth; and Janina Gavankar as his ex-wife, Angela, all of whom deliver impactful performances that show how much their characters are concerned for Jack’s well-being.  The care that they show towards Jack make their work all the more poignant because of how they seem like they have to tread carefully around him, but still want him to find the help that he needs.

The cast members who portray the basketball players are all relative unknowns, but the bond that’s shared between them has a great deal of naturalism, and the way in which they’re able to act with confidence around an established actor like Affleck helps to make the player-coach relationship very convincing.  Among the players, the one who’s given the most screen time is Brandon Wilson, who’s given some one-on-one scenes with Affleck that allow us to learn about his character and the parallels that he shares with Jack, and Wilson’s reserved performance allows us to understand the complications of his personal life that he reveals to Jack.

The screenplay by Brad Ingelsby has a noticeable use of the clichés from this type of story throughout the first 15 minutes.  However, the rest of the movie finds these tropes to be fairly understated and goes for honest emotion for every scene.  This movie is every bit a story about Jack trying to turn his basketball team into winners as it is a heartrending look into Jack’s life as he tries to amend his mistakes.  The narrative spends enough time with both of these aspects, with Jack’s interactions with his family and ex-wife providing a detailed view into his past, while his time spent with the basketball team shows the possibility for an improved future.

Just as O’Connor managed with “Miracle” and “Warrior,” he constructs exciting sports sequences that get you caught up in how badly Jack and his team want to win.  We feel the tension during every game, whether the scores for the home and visiting teams are far apart or neck-and-neck, and O’Connor succeeds in keeping us emotionally invested in each game.

When it comes to the sequences that dive into Jack’s life outside of his coaching job, the drama that’s exhibited unfolds with total genuineness because, after the opening, the movie doesn't use clichés as a crutch to garner easy emotions, but instead has the movie use Affleck’s previous real-life troubles to give this movie its heartrending impact.  O’Connor allows the cast to dig into their roles and blends their acting talents with his directing abilities to create an inspiring portrait of a man who realizes that life has much more to give him after seeming to have taken everything away, making “The Way Back” an engaging story of what it means to move forward.

Grade: A-