The Way Back (2020)
Ben Affleck plays a widowed former basketball all-star struggling with addiction in this sports drama. He attempts a comeback by becoming the coach of a high school team. From the director of Warrior and The Accountant.
Jack Cunningham (Affleck) once had a life filled with promise. In high school, he was a basketball phenom with a full university scholarship, when suddenly, for reasons unknown, he walked away from the game, forfeiting his future. Now years later, Jack is spiraling down, triggered by an unspeakable loss, and drowning in the alcoholism that cost him his marriage and any hope for a better life.
When he is asked to coach the basketball team at his alma mater, which has fallen far since his glory days, he reluctantly accepts, surprising no one more than himself. As the boys start to come together as a team and win, Jack may have finally found a reason to confront the demons that have derailed him. But will it be enough to fill the void, heal the deep wounds of his past, and set him on the road to redemption?
2020Rating: M, Offensive language & sexual references108 minsUSA
DramaSport
- Director:
- Gavin O'Connor ('The Accountant', 'Warrior')
- Writer:
- Gavin O'ConnorBrad Ingelsby
- Cast:
- Ben AffleckAl MadrigalMichaela WatkinsJanina GavankarGlynn Turman
The Way Back (2020) / Reviews
Rolling Stone
Ben Affleck brings his acting A game to this sports/redemption drama that plays way below his level, but still lets us root for the struggling star and the basketball coach he plays to find and honest way back from alcohol addiction.
Full reviewVulture
It's a performance that suggests the most interesting stretch of Affleck's career as an actor is still to come.
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Time Out
Brad Ingelsby's screenplay is the film's guiltiest instrument, shortchanging even the most conventional pleasures of a redemption-themed sports film.
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The New York Times
O'Connor finds ways to keep viewers subtly off guard; just when you think "The Way Back" will turn into a Big Game movie, it reverts to being an addiction drama (and then goes back again).
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The Guardian
The Way Back is a film stuck on the runway, quietly circling around, always threatening to fly but never managing to get off the ground.
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Hollywood Reporter
It's meant as a firm compliment to say that The Way Back looks and feels like a film that could have been made at any time between the early 1970s and right now.
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Stuff
Hampered by a needlessly talky and obvious script, and the far-too naked attempt to be a "good" film, at the expense of also being an entertaining and engaging one, The Way Back is a worthy and well made artefact.
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