This review was part of the 2023 Sundance Film Festival coverage. It was written before Jonathan Majors’ arrest and conviction for assault.
pitch: Killian Maddox (Jonathan Majors) wants one thing. Following in the footsteps of his idols (4 times, including those he writes regularly), he surrendered himself to bodybuilding, pushing down 6,000-calorie chicken breasts, pumping up iron mornings, noon and nights.
He practices poses in front of the camera, molding his physique almost perfectly, tearing steroids like diet coke. He sways protein as he watches porn, but does not masturbate. We don’t know yet whether it is due to steroid-induced impotence or some unknown aspects of his sexuality. He competes in amateur bodybuilding competitions, but the judge always finds and criticizes one muscle group, attacking it with desperate, singular vitality.
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Even when I first met him in the sophomore feature on Elijah Bynum (first at Timothee Chalamet-Starring) Hot summer night), Killian is already a man on the brink. He is shy and retreated, but is prone to violent fit and is already under the supervision of the therapist involved (Harriet Sansam Harris). He has no friends, and his grocery store colleagues (except for one lovely girl played by Haley Bennett) and customers peer at him. All he has is his body that he can control. And yet, he has reached that limit, so he swirls down a dark, dark road.
Playing with the Major: Film studies of obsessions and ambitions are nothing new. There are a lot except for bodybuilding angles Magazine dreams It’s familiar to those who have seen it all Whipping In Pumping iron, Character research on people who commit themselves to singular goals as a way of being remembered, regardless of the cost of any other field of life.
The function of Bynum exists comfortably within this realm, but it is more comprehensive than that: bodybuilding is our entry point, but through its lens we are dealt with the slow study of the sole, radical, and slowly, human souls through the code of a man who strips his support system. Killian’s room features bodybuilding posters and ambitious portraits of impossible physiques. Still, this is exactly what he is trying to do. Even if the steroids are tearing his liver, the lifespan of frustration turns his brain into a malignant soup.
Plus, Killian’s blackness feels like another log has been added to his spirit funeral pie, but Killian’s blackness is tackled head-on. The bigger he gets (and the more he gets, thanks to his rage), the more he gets, the more his blackness becomes. White customers dazzle him at the grocery store, the furious contractor beats him and calls him an “ape,” and the incident with the police goes as hard as you can imagine.
Killian tries to get through all of that pain, leading to some of the film’s most arrested sequences. His life is hard, he wants to belong. He wants to be loved and hopes that all his work will be rewarded. Because no matter how good he looks, he cannot love himself. Bynum’s approach to this element of Killian’s spirit is interesting, but it does not give us the same sense of perfection as everything else.
God helps the beast within me: The bay between reality and self-awareness proves part of it Magazine dreams“The most effective elements, especially the rest of the cast, are all relatively minor roles, taking a step back to get Major and his body to talk. At the opening minute, king Cinematographer Adam Arcapore introduces him to us, who have returned to amber stage lights, undulating muscles and sweat drops for our consumption. It is an intentionally erotic image, inviting Major to fetish black body and consume it exactly the way he wants. But then we realize how unhappy Killian is, how much scrutiny he and the massive society are scrutinizing, and that opens up Bilnam and takes his hero on a much more destructive journey in the slightly later half of the film.
Just as Killian is disappointed one after another – from the date of a disastrous excess of share with Bennett’s character to the sexually confused dynamics that develop between him and his physical idol, the film suddenly becomes more violent, Taxi driver Territories would be much more interesting if the film had space to explore those elements. Major handles these changes well, calibrating them in the same way he makes scenes in the diner, as he calibrates the same shark-eyed dedication he takes to weightlifting, or fantasizing about punishing someone who made him feel so little. But he does a lot of the heavy lifting of the script, especially as it is built to be as long as it is anti-climax.
verdict: sometimes, Magazine dreams It feels as juiced and stuffed as the main character who packs into Gel talk about American bodybuilding, masculinity, loneliness and blackness, and has absolutely no path to deal with all of these issues in sufficient detail. But because of its relentless severity it is impossible to look away from the Major’s incredible Titanic performance. Every downcast glance, every nervous laugh of blood-stained teeth, every furious bark of his explosion of frustration is completely completely charming.
Where to see: Magazine dreams It premiered at the 2023 Sundance Film Festival. It made its theatrical debut on March 21, 2025.
(TagStoTranslate)Elijah Bynum (T)Jonathan Majors (T)Sundance Film Festival