Thighs Wide Shut

The Armstrong Lie
Fraudstrong
Official Website | Trailers & Mo
R | 122 min

I have never cared for, nor paid attention to anything having to do with Lance Armstrong.  I’m not into cycling, the Tour de France, those Livestrong wristbands, who Lance dated, who Lance duped, how Lance doped, if he actually did it, why he would have done it, yadda yadda yadda yadda yadda cyclying zzzzzzzzzzzzzz.  The media loves a good celebrity scandal – I could care less.  I’m more into serial killers and assassinations and unsolved mysteries that are actually mysterious, not athletes cheating  

Now that we’ve got that out of the way – it’s time to review Alex Gibney‘s exhaustive and exhausting (par for the course of any doc he’s made) The Armstrong Lie.  Originally launched as a puff-piece documentary chronicling Armstrong’s comeback trail to the ‘009 Tour de France, it turned into something completely different after he admitted to cheating to Oprah/the public

But something funny happened on the way to vilifying the cheating, lying scum that is Lance Armstrong – you end up rooting for the guy.  Gibney basically sez so himself – being duped on his doping, but as the doc plays out, you watch a man who juss can’t/won’t/don’t quit, and wants to make his nagging naysayers say ‘yay’ not ‘nay’, and in general – just win the damn race, and amazingly, you truly will feel sympathetic for a man who has become so pathetic  

Yes, he lied, and denied, and yes, he cheated, and did everything in his power to hide that fact, but apparently everyone else in his sport did so, AND THEM SOME.  They all broke the rules, but if the playing field is level with EVERYONE cheating, doesn’t it make it fair???  I mean, he still won those races.  Nothing changes that.  They may strip him of his actual titles, but if he didn’t win them, who did?  They next cheater in line???  And what about his foundation?  Sure, its leader and icon is a total fraud, but the money raised for awareness and support of cancer patients helped – not hurt  

The lies juss perpetually got bigger and bigger AND BIGGGGGGER, and why would he or anyone associated with him want to make the fame & fortune & winning & helping stop?  Well, now it has stopped, and where do we go from here?  Nowhere, cause we still don’t care for him or racing or duping, even if we juss did for 2 hours 

Verdictgo: Jeepers Worth A Peepers

Armstrong strong arms it into NY/LA/Austin today, and elsewhere elsewhen

Chewing The Neck Fat: there’s only one thing Gibney didn’t get to the bottom of – what’s up with Dutch lawyer Emile Vrijman‘s neck????

and until next thyme the balcony is clothed…