Magnus McFaulds
Lantern Staff
Netflix takes to the court in their new original High Flying Bird that was released on Friday, Feb. 8. This movie focuses on lockouts, an event that has affected the NBA only four times in its history, the last being in the 2011 season which lasted eight months. A lockout is a time in which team owners and players do not come to an agreement over the players payment decisions.
High Flying Bird opens with Ray Burke (André Holland), a sports agent for Erick Scott (Melvin Gregg), sat across from each other in a restaurant high in the New York City skyline where they discuss the lockout with each other and how Scott has got himself in deep with a loan shark and needs the lockout to end soon. Throughout the movie, the viewer is taught small parts about the life of a sports agent who is trying to put money in his players’ pocket, although the viewer learns that this agent has far more morality than what would be expected from an agent.
Each scene pushes further and further into the stresses that the lockout causes for players, agents, preseason events and games. An hour and 30 minutes of building bit by bit brings the viewer in to what the whole lockout is all about. This movie is out of the ordinary for cinematic techniques that would typically be seen in a film; it stretches out over long scenes in one location often of two people talking. The average viewer would speak out about this saying it ruins the film and doesn’t give it enough of a kick to make it entertaining; however, this just gives the film that extra character as it takes viewers on a journey of story not cinematography.
For myself as a viewer, I think that this film does justice for what NBA lockouts can do to the people involved and that it brings people who had no idea of what such a thing was in to the light of what happens in that time and if it were to happen in the future, we would have a narrow idea of what is happening behind the closed doors. Cinematically, this film is wonderful; it pairs its long scenes with good story and visual to keep viewers interested, while also giving the average movie watcher their own idea on what films can be without a thousand fast cuts and jumps from one place to another.
Overall, I would say the film is in its own realm and has little flaws with its story telling and presentation; it is a fruitful 8.5 out of 10, and this bird does fly high.
