JBHoren

The Program: The success and calamitous failure of Lance Armstrong

Interesting article; I'd like to see the movie.

The trailer

Dave Cutter

Tragedy is my least favorite movie genre (Drama isn't much higher on my list). Schindler's List may have been the most recent big success in the tragedy genre.

I believe action and adventure is biggest in movies... in the American market, followed by comedy and romance. I LIKE the subject matter myself! But I have my doubts that a tragedy about some filthy rich arrogant asshat on a bicycle is going to pull people into theaters. Not that I'd know.

1989Pre 

Ben Foster?! You've got to be kidding. That guy's a robot. Otherwise, I would have liked to have seen this picture. I am not well-versed on new(ish) actors (guys under 30 years of age), but this role calls for someone vivacious, extreme, driven and expressive: All the things that Ben Foster is not.
I hope that Foster broke out of his stupor long enough to do this picture. It is a story that deserves to be made into a movie, but a good one. We'll see.

Loose Chain

Singling out one person to be the sin eater for an entire sport (sports) is just plain wrong. The sport of cycling has become a political joke. It is simply not a legitimate sport any longer. You cannot have events and the retroactively decide to simply not have a champion for the years he/she won and claim any legitimacy when it is factually known that nearly everybody does what was accused of the one. I am not interested in a film bashing on Lance Armstrong when I am surrounded by incompetent and corrupt politicians, business people who would take any drug needed to make a buck and now there is a television series about using a drug to boost brain power. Uh, is that like cheating?

Nobody gets as big, or fast, or as great an endurance as we are seeing with todays pro athletes without doing something to their bodies that did not come from God. Quite a few artist admit to using psychedelic and hallucinogenic drugs, should we erase all of their music, paintings and works, I mean, after all, using drugs alters the mind from its intended state? Rhetorical.

Pro cycling is embarrassing.

NormanF

A guy who cheated his way to a record 7+ Tour De France wins.

People thought it was too good to be true.

The affair made pro cycling a sad joke and Lance Armstrong showed you don't have to play fair to win a lot of times.

Gerryattrick

Love him or hate him, the Armstrong story was real and was a huge tragedy for him, the other players involved and cycling as a sport. Could make a brilliant film, but I'll reserve judgement until I see it.

Chicago Al 

I am going to take a wild guess that this thread got moved here to the Pro Cycling forum from elsewhere as Lance related posts are supposed to go into their own thread.

Being in 'the industry,' and a cycling fan, I was excited to hear about the project. I am glad to see that it's finally getting a theatrical release; it's been completed some time and has been pushed back, which is usually a bad sign of how distributors view a film's prospects. Steven Frears is certainly a good director (and a nice man) and the subject has inherent drama. I am not sure the American public cares much about Armstrong at this point, but I'll go see it!

Wileyrat

I'm not sure what this can do that "The Armstrong Lie", and "Lance Armstrong:Stop at Nothing" didn't, but if it comes out on Netflix or Amazon Prime, I'll watch it.

Wildwood 

Then you are equally embarrassed by football, basketball, baseball, soccer and other sports at the pro level. The main difference is that players in those sports have unions that negotiate on behalf of the players to limit the protocols for drug testing. The Olympics are possibly the only venue where drug testing is more rigorous than cycling. And even that is questionable. Cycling is trying hard to clean up its' act, more than most can say. What other sport automatically bans a cheater for multiple years when caught?

Edit: cycling is looking for trace levels of micro-dosing as well as the relatively blatant use in other sports.

Heck, the cheating is rampant in amateur races these days. USA's sporting culture (especially in individual sports) says your either a winner, #1 , or your not. The compensation (again, esp in individual sports) + endorsements between winners and 'also rans' is huge. They all train and augment their diet and nutrition; some just push the line too far. The list of banned substances is long. We hear there's enough steroids in some beef to test a cyclist positive.

mprelaw

Oh boy!!! Another Lance thread.

aplcr0331

The movie was ok, didn't really add much to the story. The documentaries already mentioned on Netflix do a better job. Might be worth a watch if there's nothing better to do.

VNA

"He" made his bed and has to lie on/in it!
Sociopath--this is not an insult but an observation!
He perfectly fit the definition!