REVIEW - THE ARMSTRONG LIE

Lance Armstrong opens and closes The Armstrong Lie sat on a sofa that looks strikingly similar to one which I own. Whether he is perched informally on some item of furniture in a respectably-dressed room or formally against Alex Gibney's stark black backdrop, we are encouraged to view him as the same as the rest of us. But that, itself, is a lie. There is a rabidness in his gaze, an intimidating frenzy, which enables - or empowers - him to defend himself with such vehemence, to obliterate his nemeses, to continue to fight his fight long after it has come to its ignominious close. It's an inhuman quality, one which makes it very difficult to view Armstrong as the same as the rest of us, quite plainly because he is not. He may have been about the same as the rest of his doped-up colleagues in the sport of cycling, though he seems to have lost their respect as much as ours. This fearsome, brutal aspect to his character, which seems to inform every other aspect of it, is unmissable in The Armstrong Lie, and it makes one wonder how this man ever assumed such an elevated status in popular opinion, regardless of his success. I attribute that to his nationality; we Brits like our heroes grounded and humble, Americans like theirs charismatic and, I guess, heroic. Alex Gibney's film-that-became-another-film is an intriguing prospect, more than an intriguing film - he illuminates much of the detail behind Lance Armstrong's career and subsequent downfall, though as compelling a tale as he has at his behest, it's mostly old news by now. A strong personal thrust for Gibney in making this documentary unfortunately does not manifest itself in especially personal filmmaking, nor especially inventive filmmaking. Alas, his (necessary) reliance on his 2009-era footage of the comeback film he was due to make on his subject doesn't afford him much scope for psychological probing, and that's why The Armstrong Lie feels somewhat less personal than it could have. Though in any case it would surely be quite the task to create a 'personal' documentary about a person so not the same as the rest of us.