Foxcatcher

With Foxcatcher, director Bennett Miller (Capote, Moneyball) explores the odd, tense relationship between brothers and Olympic champion wrestlers Mark and Dave Schultz (Tatum and Ruffalo) and eccentric multimillionaire John du Pont (Carell), in the years preceding a notorious 1996 crime involving two of the parties. Living in seclusion at Pennsylvania’s Foxcatcher Farms, philanthropist Du Pont decided, in the late 1980s, to get involved in the US wrestling programme, so that he might be responsible for training future gold winners and giving America 'hope.'

Primarily focused on the emotional dislocation of Du Pont and Mark Schultz, Foxcatcher brings out very strong performances from its three leads, but is burdened by its too laboured stabs at gravitas, hitting one preordained character beat after another but never managing to transform its petty rivalries into the grandiose American tragedy Miller seems to want. Sticking to the same airless tonal register throughout proves a detriment; every chilly, meticulously composed frame looks like a crime scene from the start. Sometimes unnerving, it’s too often inert. [Josh Slater-Williams]