Instead of inciting a physical response from the audience by closing in on the actual changing, the camera focuses on Gyllenhaal in the foreground as the pain overcomes him - the procedure occurs out of focus in the background. The medical team coaches him through while Erin stands by unsure of her place in the procedure.
#STRONGER MOVIE MOVIE#
This is Jeff’s story.įor such an intimate movie, Green, and cinematographer Sean Bobbitt make the movie so much more cinematic than it could have been. In an early scene, doctors are replacing Jeff’s leg bandages for the first time. That’s not what Stronger is concerned with. We see the historical events of the bombing - the hunt for the bombers and their eventual deaths - from a distance even though Jeff was instrumental in the search. We learn later that Jeff lost both of his legs just above the knee. Green shows us the bombing from Erin’s perspective, one of many genius directorial moves that maximize the emotional impact of the story. In an effort to win Erin back - she’s tried to break up with him three times at this point - Jeff plants himself at the finish line of the 2013 Boston Marathon with a homemade sign to cheer Erin on. The first 10 minutes or so of the film give us some breezy exposition about Jeff, his history with Erin, and his brash, but loving, family. He shows him as the true man he is flaws and all.
Director David Gordon Green doesn’t sanctify Jeff. He’s the kind of persistent and goofy guys that you date for a while then cut off much like Erin Hurley ( Tatiana Maslany) does to Jeff. Jeff ( Jake Gyllenhaal) is your typical blue-collar Bostonian - beer is his water, the bar is his church, and the Red Sox are his savior. Instead, Stronger focuses on the emotional and psychological trauma that comes with the physical pain.
That’s because it doesn’t focus on the physical obstacles that so many of these kinds of movies zero in on - though it certainly has its share of scenes covering Jeff’s rehabilitation. Jeff Bauman’s story feels like one that Hollywood would consume into its “based on a true story” formula and spit out an emotionally manipulative story of triumph over adversity. Subverting genre tropes, Stronger is a humanist story about triumph over adversity with stellar performances by Jake Gyllenhaal and Tatiana Maslany.