Admittedly, as an independent critic, I have no editor telling me what to watch. What I love about documentaries, and why I often take a swing on ones I have little interest in, is that I might learn something, or gain perspective.That’s my way of telling you I do not like Tennis. I don’t follow it. I can’t even fully conceive how much of a GOAT Roger Federer is compared to the other male tennis players, even after this Amazon doc.
This is essentially content creation for Amazon. Someone followed roger around for the final days of his career before his retirement, got a lot of his musings on tape, and interviewed some of his contemporaries. to be honest, the Netflix limited docuseries Beckham went deeper than this. I think this works mainly for fans of Roger Federer, and to a lesser extent tennis fans.
But I also don’t want to come in like a critical wrecking ball because I didn’t feel like my mind was blown wide open, and this turned me into an overnight tennis super fan. I do have realistic expectations. This just isn’t flashy, it isn’t anything that really pushes the form or its subject, and honestly is just a thank you to fans.
The good news is that this does have audio description, so when the boys are bouncing their balls around, you can follow it. That sounded dirty, and I’m sorry, but that’s tennis. Boys whacking balls back and forth at each other. Those who are the best, ultimately have a really good grip when they whack, and Roger Federer is one of the best at getting his balls consistently to the other guy. Or, really just out of reach of the other guy, so he can score. OK. I’m done now.
Sometimes I get something from a documentary on a subject I know nothing about. I didn’t really get that here, but I’m gonna grade it a little on a curve because I think an actual fan would enjoy this.
Final Grade: B-
