Empire UK

VERDICTThe inside track on one of

sport’s biggest scandals nimbly shot

and sharply scripted powered by an

outstanding performance from Foster

and the quiet integrity of O’Dowd.

HE PROGRAM IS

a fi lm with go-faster

stripes. Its opening

credits sell the

exhilaration and

freedom of cycling

and the danger and

achievement of the Tour de France.

Its closing roll with “where are they

now?” captions prods and informs

until the fi nal sentence. It powers on

visually dynamic and like its compelling

antihero doesn’t have an inch of fat on it.

Virtually everybody knows the name

Lance Armstrong: cancer survivor and

Tour de France champion inspirational

author and charity activist American

idol and massive cheat. Plenty of us read

his books and felt awe at his journey

from facing death to reaching glory

and found the pesky allegations that he

was taking drugs to be mealy mouthed

fairy tale-wrecking in a too-cynical age.

And then of course they were right.

The Program assumes you know

this and takes you inside the process —

from the moment the young Lance (Ben

Foster) sees he has to cheat to triumph

to the cosseted champion eventually

undone by his own hubris. And it is

fascinating. Armstrong is obsessed by

the desire to win to turn his team —

The United States Postal Service — into

a ‘Blue Train’ of cyclists blitzing the

opposition. By any means necessary. He

meets with unscrupulous Italian medic

Michele Ferrari (Guillaume Canet) who

dismisses him as the wrong body shape

but enlists him on his ‘program’ when

Armstrong returns light and sinewy

after chemotherapy. These scenes as

Armstrong is inducted into Ferrari’s

methods tuned up like a machine are

a clinic in clever exposition showing

us the process and quietly asking where

we would draw the line — even if Canet

having rather a lot of fun proves French

actors can match English or Americans

for outrageous Italian accents.

Along Lance’s journey from survivor

to record-breaker cycling is quietly

damned and the media too — as the

authorities and newspapers largely look

the other way happy to sell a dream to

the public. All as presented here anyway

exceptSunday Timesjournalist David

Walsh (Chris O’Dowd) who nips at the

heels of the arrogant Texan infuriated

by how he and his like are destroying the

sport he loves. This is a superbly cast and

Red Army

★★★★

OUTOCTOBER 9/CERT. 15 /84 MINS.

DIRECTORGabe Polsky

CASTSlava Fetisov Scotty Bowman

Vladislav Tretiak

➞Like Rocky IV on ice Gabe Polsky’s

enthralling doc nips behind the Iron

Curtain to tell the story of the Soviet

Red Army side of the ’70s and ’80s

the greatest ice hockey team in history.

Defenseman Slava Fetisov takes the

Drago role as the team’s spiritual leader

in a film which probes at the priorities of

a regime that prized sporting glory over

all else. His interviews with Polsky are as

entertaining as his slick interplay in the

rink even if the main mystery — how such

a controlling state could breed a team

so packed with spontaneity and artistry

— remains tantalisingly out of reach.PDS

The Lobster
★★★
OUT OCTOBER 16 / CERT. 15 / 118 MINS.
DIRECTOR Yorgos Lanthimos
CAST Colin Farrell Rachel Weisz
Léa Seydoux

➞ In some ill-defi ned future or alternative
present the recently single or perpetually
unattached are required to book into a
hotel where they have 45 days to fi nd
a romantic match or be turned into the
animal of their choice (a disappointingly
peripheral process). Farrell’s forlorn
architect David ditched by his wife has
decided upon a lobster because he likes
the sea. Greek New Waver Lanthimos’
Kafkaesque sci-fi is a surreal exploration
of the rules of attraction that we think
set us above animal kind. The results are
inordinately strange and tiresomely glum
but in spots hideously funny. IN

Sinister 2

★★

OUT NOW / CERT. 15 / 97 MINS.

DIRECTOR Ciarán Foy

CAST Shannyn Sossamon James

Ransone Dartanian Sloan

➞ A standard follow-up to the solid

horror-mystery. Abused wife Sossamon

hides out in a church where a massacre

took place and her two sons fall under

the spell of the demon who was behind

the curse from the fi rst fi lm. It features

more talking-point 8mm family snuff fi lms

staged as very nasty jokes and spends

more time with the pack of well-spoken

malicious spectral kids who are agents

of the boogeyman. However the story

ties itself in knots over its extraordinarily

complicated curse and the occasional

decent scare doesn’t elevate it much

from the Insidious-Paranormal pack. KN

DID

YOU

KNOW?

Lobsters

can live up

to 70 years

and do not

weaken

slow down

or lose

fertility with

age. They

can also

regenerate

limbs...

performed picture — each tiny bit-player

has personality — though obviously the

tour-de-force of the Tour de France

tragedy is Foster who is mesmeric

frighteningly committed and uncannily

like Armstrong. To the point that it’s

hard to see however much you strain

the segues between archive and freshly

fi lmed footage. His Armstrong is

something of a monster true but there are

moments of self-doubt and questioning

and some genuine compassion — the

cancer ward visit is a grace note —

that Foster sells completely. O’Dowd

though requiring much less physical

transformation is superb as someone

just as driven in his own way: desperate

for the truth. Stephen Frears quietly

does his thing orchestrating it all —

from John Hodge’s deft script — and

cinematographer Danny Cohen is all

Dutch angles and energy putting us on

the bike and inside the head space of the

world’s greatest... cheat. NEV PIERCE