Fair Play movie review. Fair Play, which was released as part of Netflix’s original content in October 2023, is director Chloe Domont’s first feature-length directorial ‘work’ after the short films and series episodes she shot. Director Domont, who was born in 1987, which can be called a relatively ‘light-baked’ director, is also the screenwriter of the film. In other words, we can put everything that we don’t like in the production on Domont’s shoulders like a scapegoat.
Emily (Phoebe Dynevor) and Luke (Alden Ehrenreich) are a couple in love, working at an important finance and investment company in New York and keeping their relationship secret due to company rules. Luke has been working in this company, which was his youth’s dream, for a long time and promotions are being discussed in the company.
However, when the company manager Campbell (Eddie Marsan) makes an unexpected decision and promotes Emily instead of Luke, the balance between the couple is disrupted and has a negative impact on their relationship. While Emily believes that she has achieved the position she has long deserved with the sweat of her brow, Luke believes that his rights have been violated and is jealous of Emily both in terms of her position and of all the other men in the management level, especially Campbell.
While the scenario frames the ruthlessness of the American finance and stock market sector, it also talks about the difficulty of trying to survive in this wild jungle while preserving one’s humanity. Moreover, while doing this, the mobbing, conflict of interest, slander, etc. that a devoted female employee was/will be exposed to. tries to list injustices; But, unfortunately, these painful issues are treated in a superficial and cliché way.
Domont, which tries to handle these themes with elements of tension and passion, unfortunately fails in supporting elements that need to be filled in, such as the characters’ past, motivations, environment and relationships with their relatives. In the film, the depth of the relationship between Emily and Luke is ignored, except for the sexual aspect that embellishes the film.
In this context, unfortunately, the acting in the film is not very satisfactory. Although Phoebe Dynevor tries to give her best performance in the role of Emily, she has difficulty reflecting the emotional conflicts of her character. Alden Ehrenreich remains a dull and one-dimensional character in the role of Luke. He cannot convincingly convey Luke’s emotions such as jealousy, anger and inferiority complex towards Emily.
As we mentioned above, the couple’s relationships with the other side characters in the film remain quite superficial. We can only consider Campbell, the boss of the company, played by Eddie Marsan, as contributing to the story to some extent. Apart from these, details such as other characters in the office and the couple’s family coming to the surprise engagement party leave the island without contributing much to the story…
The dark atmosphere that surrounds the film was actually designed in this way to increase the effect of the tension parts of the story; Most of the scenes take place either in the office or at home, creating atmosphere, using dramatic lighting, etc. We can say that it is above a certain line in technical matters for Fair Play. Although the use of music by Brian McOmber in the film was chosen to support the tension, we can say that the choice of the song “There Is Love”, which we heard from the voice of Charles Hodges in the finale, was the best choice, along with the finale of the film, which tried to be striking.
In summary, unfortunately, Chloe Domot seems to have wasted a subject that could be handled very well and will be remembered when handled well, with a mediocre narrative and acting direction. Unfortunately, Fair Play is not at a satisfactory point in terms of the acting that tries to convey the story. If you want to watch the real wild face of the Wall Street market, where bright and handsome boys dominate, you can add the most well-known productions, starting with the legendary Wall Street (1987), to The Wolf of Wall Street (2013) and The Big Short (2015); You can crown this marathon by adding the taster documentary Inside Job (2010) alongside the films Margin Call (2011) and Too Big to Fail (2011).
Fair Play (2023)
Directed by: Chloe Domont
Starring: Phoebe Dynevor, Alden Ehrenreich, Eddie Marsan, Rich Sommer, Sebastian De Souza, Sia Alipour, Yacine Ramoul, Brandon Bassir, Jamie Wilkes, Geraldine Somerville, Linda Ljoka
Screenplay by: Chloe Domont
Production Design by: Steve Summersgill
Cinematography by: Menno Mans
Film Editing by: Franklin Peterson
Costume Design by: Kate Forbes
Set Decoration by: Milan Damnjanovic, Sonja Nenadic
Art Direction by: Ivana Lovre, Srdjan Nedeljkovic
Music by: Brian McOmber
MPAA Rating: R for pervasive language, sexual content, some nudity, and sexual violence.
Distributed by: Netflix
Release Date: September 29, 2023
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