Film Preview: Borg vs. McEnroe (2018)

Page Revisions:

(March 11, 2018) Original
(April 8, 2018) New Poster (#7)

Release Date:

April 13, 2018

Synopsis:

From IMDb: “Borg/McEnroe is a film about one of the world’s greatest icons Björn Borg and his biggest rival, the young and talented John McEnroe and their legendary duel during the 1980’s Wimbledon tournament. It’s a story about two men who changed the face of tennis and who became legends and the price they had to pay.”

Poster Rating: D+ (2) / C / C- / C- / C / C+

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Review: (#1 & #2) This character poster pair isn’t that interesting with a lifeless background and a rear pose that doesn’t tell us a thing about either character. (#3) The background is a bit dull, but the rest of the design is a little better constructed, establishing hierarchy and significance. (#4) The images from the two character posters have an origin (or were re-purposed for this design). That does not make either design better and the overly staged nature of this design works against it. (#5) Two men who are almost one with a bright, shining light and a bland background. It just doesn’t work. (#6) It’s a rather clunky design, but it has a balanced color scheme pulled directly from the image it depicts. It feels a bit forced, but it’s an improvement over the other designs.

(#7) It’s intense and sells Shia LaBeouf, but this is supposedly Borg’s story, not McEnroe’s, which makes the tool suspect and even more questionable considering the dull white background.

Trailer Rating: C- / B / B-

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Review: (#1) A teaser trailer for a film like this seems odd and the end result doesn’t justify it.

(#2) The red band trailer has only some mild language in it, so it’s not clear why it requires that treatment, but the film presented is an interesting one about drive and success, the calm and the storm. It’s a fascinating look at two tennis champions.

(#3) It’s surprising that the trailer with no questionable language is less interesting than the one with as the language doesn’t add anything to it. However, this trailer is a bit less interesting, possibly because it focuses more on McEnroe than it should, but the film doesn’t look that much worse than the prior trailer.