New to VOD this week:
ON THIN ICE
Director:
Keli Price
World Premiere:
VOD release (Feb 2021)
About:
A look at athletes how have faced inequalities in competitive sports.
Filmmaker Keli Price’s great-grandfather, Jack Brooks, was a speed skater who was barred from competing for the US in the 1932 Winter Olympics because he was Jewish, as related at the beginning of this doc. Perhaps recognizing that there wasn’t a feature in that story, Price broadens his scope to look at other instances of athletes who had to break barriers to make for a more equitable playing field. To that end, he references historical examples, like Jesse Owens at the 1936 Olympics, but primarily focuses on more modern day examples, including Michael Sam as the first openly gay pro football player; Bonnie Blair, a female speed skater; Robbie Rogers, an openly gay pro soccer player; Greg Louganis, on confronting homophobia during his time as a pro diver; among others. The result is an earnest, but workmanlike, talking heads-focused project that unfortunately is so wide-ranging that it can’t help but become a vague survey.
what (not) to doc 