Bigger, Stronger, Faster*
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Movie Reviews of Bigger, Stronger, Faster*
Movie Review: Compelling!
Summary: 5 Stars
From STRONGANDFIT.NET
Synopsis:
Christopher Bell and his two brothers were typical kids of the 80's. They grew up watching Hulk Hogan, Sylvester Stallone, and Arnold Schwarzenegger. Like their idols, all three of the Bell brothers began lifting weights. Christopher's brothers even pursued wrestling careers, and used steroids to enhance their performance. Bigger, Stronger, Faster explores the impact of steroid use on Christopher's family and America as a whole.
My Reaction:
This movie hits close to home on many levels. Christopher is my age, and like me, he's a formerly chubby kid who to turned to weights in his teenage years. I can also relate to his admiration of Hogan, Stallone, and Schwarzenegger (I bought Arnold's Encyclopedia of Modern Bodybuilding) when I was a teenager.
I think this is the best documentary I've ever watched. Here are a few of my impressions:
*I'm embarrassed by the amount of time and money our government has put into the "steroid problem"--is this really a national crisis? All we have to show for their efforts is legislation based on zero research.
*There's a great deal of hypocrisy in the way America looks at steroids. Getting corrective eye surgery is not cheating, but steroid use is. We pay millions to watch athletes to perform at super-human levels, but we get upset when they use every means necessary to do so.
*The people you "meet" in this movie are fascinating case studies. They represent our obsession with both physical perfection and false hopes.
*I love the way Bell exposes the media hysteria regarding steroids. Bell neither promotes nor condemns steroid use. Instead, he attempts to present both sides of the issue.
If you want to see a brutally honest look at the steroid issue, buy this movie.
[...]
Movie Review: Little man complex tacken to the extreme with naivitity
Summary: 3 Stars
No one other than 12 year old bots are shocked when they find out Arnold Schwarzenegger and Hulk Hogan used anabolic steroids. The documentary is angled from the smallest of three brother who doesn't use steroids and his brothers do. They are also much physically larger than him as well which describes most of the physical advantages, and in part steroids.It takes you through the life of gym rat junkies thinking muscles with open the door to fame and fortune. The three brothers are moderately obese but strong as horses. This fact eludes them throughout the film, while at the same time having the minds of 21 year old boys in grown men's bodies. I mean no disrespect to the brother with a learning disability but the other two were pathetic.
Was really only impressed with the view interviews of congressmen and people giving testimony as to the shallow depth of coverage banning decisions were based on.
I'm sure it will continue to get five stars based on the level of interest in learning about the subculture. In fact it almost tells you how to enlist. (Freeze frame when the football coach open his stash).
Movie Review: Biceps in Balance!
Summary: 5 Stars
Bigger, Stronger, Faster is a well done, honestly written documentary that avoids the usual hyperbole involved in the steroid debate. It's balanced and personal and deals with real lives of people who you know and with whom you work and live. It stays away exclusive focus on steriod usage in the upper eschalon of athletes and bodybuilders. And the personal struggles and the willingness to do whatever at whatever risk to achieve a goal is both insightful as well as a bit chilling. I left watching this a little less clear about my opinion than I was before -- and that's a sign of a well done presentation. Movie Review: Excellent!!!
Summary: 5 Stars
Finally the truth about the Ben Johnson' case. The whole world know that the american athletes only compete "in juice". Always there were stories about a tam arriving in a country to a competition and, when knew that they have a dopping test, the whole team returned to america. Also, is was commom, some years ago, that always when a no american athlet won a international competion, some "dopping test" take back the medal and it fall in american hands. We, that live in another countries always was intrigued how it can happen ,if american atlets are always " in juice"?!!
This docummentary show how, explainin that Ben Johson/Carl Lewis controversy and we have only a honest conclusion to this: in a competition wiht all athletes juiced, the real champion was Ben Johnson, not Carl Lewis. However, this film show much more than this and help to clear some myths against steroids.
A much more message dominates the whole film: Why these poor people think that they only worth if they "the first one, the better one, the bigger one"? This point apperas to in Bowling for Columbine. What is wrong with a view of a whole society that can not be happy being good husband, good worker, good friend, good father or mother? THIS IS RESULT OF A IDEOLOGICAL BRAINWASH! You have no right to happiness if you are not a "perfect gear to the system".
Only a point I think that is a little exagerating: Arnold Schwarzenegger is the "dark ship" in this film. Please, when he began, so much muscles was a obstacle, not a advantage, to actor career! He launched a new standard because he is a PERSONALITY. The secret never were his muscles or he never would act in another movies beyond adventures. We always like his face, his voice, his charisma, and if in USA there are thousands of musclemen, the most in juice, how explain that they are not so famous as Schwarzenegger? The muscles never was the answer to success, there is no shortcuts to explain this, some people have qualities that, as unique human beings, help them to be a success in some goals and are obstacles to another, and the most of them are innate qualities, not created qualities, as a brainwasher ideology would like the people believe.
The problem with steroids is the truth: if the champions always tell the truht and the people can choose if they want to risk their health to be "hugge" or "the first one", or if they will choose ohter goal or other heroes that do't use them. For example, if you know that a man 5'9" only can reach 220 lbs with natural training you can be satisfied and a sucess weighting 200-220. But if you, because steroids, believe that a man 5'9" can wieght 280lbs, you will kill yourself trying to reach this, and when you reach ONLY 220lbs you can think that you are a failure. If you know the truth you can choose the truth or the cheating, and analize your sucess in a more realistic base (220 to natural, 280 to juiced). The truth free us, always!
Movie Review: Thought provoking documentary that may shatter your preconceptions ..
Summary: 5 Stars
"Our heroes have always used steroids ..." Or is that how the song goes???
I expected this to be an anti-steroid film. It was neither that nor a pro-steroid commercial. Instead, it is a thoughtful and thought-provoking documentary of the role of performance enhancers in our society. It seems to imply that steroids are wrapped up in the American culture (though elsewhere the film implies that the American sports establishment started using them to ape the Soviets, echo were kicking our butts in the Olympics.)
Focal to the story is the tale of three brothers from Poughkeepsie, NY. Adolescent chubbies, all three grew up to worship weightlifting, which took them on common paths of anabolic steroid use.
(Any film that makes Rep. Henry Waxman look like an idiot can't be all bad, not that that is such a difficult task.)
This film will grab you by the biceps and pecs, command your attention and make cause you to re-think much of what we have been conditioned to decide about anabolic steroids.
A good film!