In 2014 Bennett Miller unearthed a story following the Foxcatcher wrestling team and translated it into one of the most compelling dramas of the current decade, evoking themes about what success and the American dream look like in conjunction to sports and wealth. I stand by that film as one that will only get better with time and a showcase in career-best performances from all three leads, not to mention a gripping drama.
Due to my interest and thorough enjoyment of this film, when I heard Netflix would be releasing a documentary about the same subject, I was immediately on board. I rewatched the majority of Bennett Miller’s film ahead of time to refresh my memory (highly recommended). As it turns out, while Miller’s film remains a fascinating depiction, the documentary covers even more territory that may have been too wild or unbelievable to include in a narrative film.
The documentary exclusively focuses on the relationship between John Eleuthère du Pont and the wrestling team led by Dave Schultz, and thanks to interviews with his former teammates, we get a really clear sense of how bonkers Du Pont’s behavior really was. The real-life events depicted in the documentary are a tragic study of what may have made Du Pont so insane.
Having grown up on the family estate, he never had proper friendships or a relationship with his immediate family, and that matched with a few of his personal failures pretty thoroughly screwed him up. There is a compelling contradiction that an extremely wealthy and generous man is trying to prove himself to a group of wrestlers and yet can’t quite force it. And as much as you empathize with some of these bits, he’s still as villainous as can be, more so in real life than in Steve Carell’s depiction. This is what makes the “Foxcatcher” drama something that you can’t look away at.
The real-life events depicted in the documentary are a tragic study of what may have made Du Pont so insane. Having grown up on the family estate, he never had proper friendships or a relationship with his immediate family, and that matched with a few of his personal failures pretty thoroughly screwed him up. There is a compelling contradiction that an extremely wealthy and generous man is trying to prove himself to a group of wrestlers and yet can’t quite force it. And as much as you empathize with some of these bits, he’s still as villainous as can be, more so in real life than in Steve Carell’s depiction. This is what makes the “Foxcatcher” drama something that you can’t look away at.
The documentary benefits from having a vast amount of great archival footage, home videos from the wrestling families who lived on the Foxcatcher estate, as well as some documentaries made by Du Pont himself to highlight his wrestling facility. That little bit ties in extremely nicely to Bennett Miller’s film, and throughout this documentary we’re only affirmed at just how well he captured the look and feel of the characters and the estate. We will have some really compelling documentaries that take place from 1990 to present day due to the boom of home video and the immense amount of our lives that are being filmed nowadays, which is a discussion unto itself. In this case, every image we see of John Du Pont completely confirms what the interview subjects are saying about him, and because we know it’s real due to the archival footage, it’s even more baffling how much madness is at play.
This is a rare case of a true story so multidimensional that you can watch a feature film followed by a documentary and still feel like there’s even more to the story. Rarely have I been so satisfied with the experience and I can only recommend the same for each of you. Rent up “Foxcatcher” (even if you’ve already seen it a rewatch isn’t the worst idea) then stream “Team Foxcatcher” on Netflix and experience one of the most unnerving dramas that recent history has provided us with.
‘Team Foxcatcher’ is now available to stream on Netflix
