'Battle Of The Sexes' A Review

Battle Of The Sexes is a period dramedy about the 1973 tennis match between champion Billie Jean King(Emma Stone) and aging former champ Bobby Riggs(Steve Carell). The film opens on King and Gladys Heldman(Sarah Silverman) forming a separate women's circuit as a response to the USLTA's refusal to offer women the same prize money as men. We simultaneously see listless and declining hustler Riggs as he avoids his family and chases after cheap thrills. He gets the idea to challenge the women's champion and heavily promote the match as a Battle of the Sexes. There is also a poorly executed romantic subplot with King and her hairdresser Marilyn(Andrea Riseborough).

Stone is passable as King but lacks edge, she doesn't play it demure exactly but she is reserved and almost naive to the point of unbelievability for the political sports legend.This isn't necessarily her fault as the story this version of King is in is stunningly tame and soft. Carell is given equal if not more screen time than Stone which, given history and the inherent righteousness of King's position is kind of astounding. His performance as the rakish buffoon is good(I guess) but the fact that Riggs was either an awful misogynist or at least pretending to be one(what's the difference) isn't really addressed, is seemingly excused and attempted to be explained by the script. He's rendered sympathetic in a way that is borderline offensive. The other cast members don't have much to do and their performances are almost unilaterally muted and confused. Again, through no fault of the actors but through the problematic script and undefined direction.

Visually the film is underwhelming, for a story about a famous tennis match there is very little tennis in it. The titular match is filmed from an overhead angle that is exactly like that which normal sports coverage is shot. It is unexciting with little sense of the stakes. The story is so convoluted and toned down there is almost no sense of how revolutionary and important Billie Jean King was and is. And that above and beyond the half-hearted film making is what is so distasteful and off putting.

Disappointing and mediocre, a disservice to an American legend.

Don't See It.