Bronze Medal Thats Cute I Like It Youre a Funny Guy Joey
Much like Idiocracy & Office Space its a movie with tremendous re-watchability & quotable lines that you will be saying over & over.
"I had no control of what people talk about. Take that up with the God of gymnastics." Hope (Rauch) is the darling of her little town after winning bronze in the 1984 Olympics. Since that time she has made a living just being her and making sure everyone knows who she is. When her former coach dies she is asked to train America's greatest hope at a gold, Maggie (Richardson). Hope must now make a choice, train her to be better than she was, or give up the chance to collect $500,000. This is a hilarious movie, just flat out hilarious. Offensive, over the top and so laugh out loud funny that I had to rewind this a few times to catch the jokes I was missing. Rauch is incredible in this and almost everything she says is comedy gold. If you offend easy this is a movie you should probably avoid, but if you are a fan of R rated comedies this is one of the best ones I have seen in a long time. This is the type of movie I could watch over and over and still laugh every time. Overall, not a movie that will win awards but much like Idiocracy and Office Space its a movie with tremendous re-watchability and quotable lines that you will be saying over and over. I loved this and easily give this an A.
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Crass and Funny
The Bronze
Low budget comedy that gets overlooked. Check. Amazing dialogue that will make your grandma be tickled pink. Check. Amazing acting from under-appreciated actors. Check. The Bronze is about a former medalist who has to struggle with no longer being in the limelight. The opening scene in the film is by far the most interesting way to introduce a character I've seen in a long time.
Melissa Rauch plays Hope. The extremely crass gymnast who doesn't care what she says but truly cares what people think of her. The first time I heard her voice I immediately thought of Bernadette Rostenkowski from Big Bang Theory, but then as she spoke more and she transformed into Hope.
Gary Cole plays another father figure. You might remember him from Reese Bobby from Talladega Nights or as Bill Lumbergh from Office Space. He's has a great character who just wants to make his daughter happy but at the same time be a responsible father.
Sebastian Stan plays Bucky Barns, no wait that's who he plays in Captain America, Stan plays Lance. Hope doesn't like most people, so when I say she hates Lance, it means something. He was a silver and gold medalist and took something very important to Hope when she was younger.
Haley Lu Richardson is excellent as an up and coming gymnast. This was the first time I've really seen her act. That being said I'm excited to see her in M. Night Shyamalan's Split coming out in 2017.
Verdict: I wouldn't recommend this to someone whose easily offended. If you've got the skin for it, I can't recommend this comedy more.
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Bad gymnast
In some ways, "The Bronze" is so entertaining because Melissa Rauch is playing someone in diametric opposition to her mousy character on "The Big Bang Theory". Hope Gregory is the sort of Olympics washout that's fun to laugh at; a foul-mouthed brat who trades in her local celebrity for free stuff at the mall. Rauch really plays the Midwestern accent to the hilt, and it pairs very nicely with the coarse dialogue.
Somewhere in all of this is a sports movie, but that's not where it excels. This character ends up right back where she started, and it works great as an exaggerated portrait of a has-been in a no-name town. This flew completely under my radar, and I was surprised (happily) by how enjoyable it was.
She's very funny.
7/10
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The Bronze wins Gold
I want to start out by saying this film is fantastic..! It starts out REALLY slow & I almost made the mistake by turning it off but I stuck with it & boy am I glad.. Melissa Rauch who I'd never heard of before watching this film is hilarious.. She plays a mean foul mouthed former Olympian bronze medalist who is still living off that fame 12 yrs later & plays the part like a BOSS..!
*******WARNING*******
This film isn't for everyone it is filled with cuss words, sexual innuendos, nudity & a whole bunch of funny so if you like any or all of the above you'll love this film.. 7.5/10
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Like it more as a sports movie on Gymnastics than as a comedy about coming in third
I was not expecting much so I got a little more than I was bargaining for. It's not the best comedy that I've ever seen, but it's a pretty decent sports movie.
Very grounded in reality, The Bronze is about a gymnast still living off the moment she took the Bronze in the 2004 Olympics who is forced to train another gymnast from her hometown going for the gold.
Definitely amusing to watch Melissa Rauch (who I just realizes is one of the girls on The Big Bang Theory) as Hope, whose sad existence made for some laughable moments as she attempts to sabotage the promising career of Maggie, a bright eyed gold medal contender who worships the ground Hope walks on. I thought Haley Lu Richardson performance as Maggie was a definite highlight to a movie that did not have much going as far as real interesting characters.
It's not laugh out loud funny but it has some enjoyable moments. It does work as a sports movie with a more down to Earth summary of overcoming obstacles to be a winner and what happens when that moment is over.
Something to watch on the whim if you see on Netflix or something.
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Crass but funny
Warning: Spoilers
Really crass language, kind of shocked me not just at the start of the movie, but throughout the movie. But I found it really funny, think the startling factor added to that haha.
I may also be biased because I really like Rauch's Bernadette character,so seeing her cuss and be incredibly surly just kept making , me laugh.
Appreciated the character growth and the warmth that grew between the coach and her protege, and also found their ending realistic, not too idealistic.
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No medal for this mediocrity.
"I'm not a coach—I'm a star!" Hope (Melissa Rauch)
The Bronze is not a comedy—it's a dreary drama! A has-been bronze 2004 Olympic medalist, Hope, can't get over her misfortune of pulling an Achilles heel in that 2004 competition and thus aborting her future plans for gold. I suppose her bitter personality, verbally abusing everyone in her path, could qualify for dark comedy, but Billy Bob's Bad Santa she's not, certainly not Fargo or Shaun of the Dead.
When Hope is spitting invective on everyone, Hope has a Midwestern twang truly annoying and crying out for a coach. Beside that irritation, Ms. Rauch and her husband, Winston, have few if any lines worth the comic designation. Humorous in its own way is love interest Ben's (Thomas Middleditch) constant twitching, but even that endearing affliction gets old soon. Gary Cole playing her dad is a pro as a weak father trying to balance out his beloved daughter emotionally while she continues to abuse him verbally.
So you ask what's good besides Gary Cole? Well, Hope's transformation into a semi-civilized person comes as she's forced to coach sweet Olympic hopeful, Maggie (Haley Lu Richardson), a rival for the small-town Ohio's worship of Hope's Bronze achievement. Hope is much more likable as a coach than a former athlete, and some of those coach scenes are believable.
Also noteworthy is the production design, especially Hope's room filled with tacky trophies and teddy bears, attesting to this film's greatest achievement—a story of arrested development with little hope that Hope will be a model citizen. After all, it takes some moral fiber to disavow casual sex and mail theft for their cheap acquisition.
Her last scene, however, promises a transformation we get too little of during our time with her .
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A one-note film that doesn't know when to quit.
I did not enjoy "The Bronze", though the premise sounded very promising and the film could have worked. The main character, Hope (Melissa Rauch) was thoroughly despicable--super-crude, nasty, self-absorbed and without redeeming qualities. And, this tended to make the film a very one-note sort of viewing experience...something that wouldn't have happened had the film either been a short or if there was more to the movie than that. As it is, it's a hard movie to like or even enjoy.
Hope is a woman who won a Bronze medal back in 2004. Since then, she's done nothing with her life and she spends her time feeling sorry for herself, stealing, masturbating, doing drugs, treating everyone around her like dirt as well as living as if the world owes her. When her old coach kills herself, Hope is given a chance to do something with her life....to coach a young gymnastic hopeful to glory. However, at first, Hope just wants to destroy her new charge and gets her using drugs, overeating and making a mess of herself. Later, very inexplicably, she kinds of takes her job seriously....and becomes nice, sort of. What's to come of all this? And, more importantly, does anyone even care or does this make any sense?
When I read the reviews for this film, I was very surprised that most seemed reasonably positive and the film has an overall score of 5.9....not good but certainly not terrible. Well, I thought the film was rather terrible...mostly because Hope was so unremittingly awful and unlikable...and this went on and on and on. The woman is ONLY a jerk and her language would make Joe Pesci's character in "Good Fellas" blush. Crudeness and nastiness alone do not make a good comedy--especially after the novelty of it all quickly wears off. And, for me, it wore off very quickly and the film repeatedly comes CLOSE to being funny but almost never does it connect.
By the way, despite my strongly disliking the film and how crude it was, oddly, the funniest moment was the dirtiest--with one of the funniest and most acrobatic sex scenes in film history. I say watch that scene and ignore the rest. Also, if you want to see a similar sort of sports comedy that works, try "Blades of Glory".
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I seem to be fairly alone here, but I enjoyed the heck out of this
A gleefully profane comedy with good performances and well written characters. Melissa Rauch (best known for her role on the sitcom The Big Bang Theory) stars as a washed-up gymnast who is coasting on her 10+ year old glory as a bronze medalist in her small hometown in Ohio. She's pretty much a prick to everyone, especially her father (Gary Cole), but she is forced to try to get back on the ball when her former coach commits suicide, leaving her promising new student (Haley Lu Richardson) in need of guidance. This is more dramatic than one might have been led to believe, but Rauch is hilarious in all her foul-mouthed glory. Thomas Middleditch is also very good as her assistant/love interest. The film is far from perfect, with some plot developments that don't work very well and some poorly directed bits (the big nude sex scene, which finally shows us what Jerry Seinfeld wanted when he dated a gymnast in that one episode, is, I'm guessing, cut to pieces to get an R rating, but it also feels weirdly like it's out of some other movie). I enjoyed it a lot, though.
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You'll Never Look at Gymnastics in the Same Light Again
Warning: Spoilers
If you've ever wondered what would the world be like if Olympic champion gymnast Mary Lou Retton returned to her hometown of Fairmont, West Virginia and acted like an egotistical maniac for years after her career was finished, then director Bryan Buckley and married writing team Melissa and Winston Rauch have the filthy dark comedy you've been craving. Gymnast Hope Annabelle Greggory (Rauch) believes her hometown of Amherst, Ohio still owes her everything after winning the bronze medal in Rome. She's broke, rude, crude and treats everyone like a used toilet seat. But things change when Hope's former coach unexpectedly commits suicide and leaves a will stipulating Hope could receive $500 million so as long as she sets her ego aside and trains the town's up-and-coming gymnastics star, Maggie Townsend (Haley Lu Richardson). Team Rauch offers an explicitly lewd comedy that lets the "Big Bang Theory" star off the FCC regulation chain and shine as a fearless female comedian lead, which, sadly, does not happen as often as it should in modern-day cinema. Actor Gary Cole lends his skills as Hope's adoring father who's growing ever so tired of his daughter's disgusting behavior. With dialogue that would make a sailor blush and a sex scene that will burn hysterically disturbing imagery in your mind for life, you will never look at the sport of gymnastics in the same light ever again! -Jimmy Martin
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A winning sport movie
Warning: Spoilers
I am surprised that the movie flopped and received many bad reviews. In my opinion it was a really good movie.
Melissa Rauch does a great job as the lead character. She is raunchy funny but she is not a one dimensional character and through her depth we see her also as a vulnerable, hurt and lost person.
It is both a comedy and drama. And I like the balance between them. We laugh in between but the main parts of the movie are actually not all that funny and more emotional. I did laugh a lot, but I absolutely enjoyed watching Hope rediscovering her love for life, including the great confrontation scene with her father.
The movie is better than most sports movies. It is not too sweet and written by the common formula. But it includes some good scenes related to the sport like for example the gymnastics sex scene.
The ending also makes one happy. This is what we have been rooting through this movie and it is nice to see it happening.
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Ignore the haters, this movie is funny as hell
Warning: Spoilers
This is the story of a a strong willed supremely selfish foul mouthed Olympic athlete who gets over herself. (Or does she?)
It's got Gymnastic lovin', gymnastic swearing, jabs at men's gymnastics (which, let's face it, no one gives a rat's gluteus about) secret handshakes, and an authentic small- town feel.
What's not to love?
Also, it has Bernadette.
Sure, the characters could have been fleshed out a little more (heh heh) but this ain't a period drama, it's a feel good comedy about winning, selfishness, maturity and being a stubborn but excellent human.
And when was the last time you saw a movie casting gymnastics in a positive light?
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"3rd Place, 1st Winner"
Really good watch, would watch again, and can recommend.
Finally a movie that proves that Melissa Rauch was the hot one on "Big Bang Theory".
Melissa Rauch carries this one, above and beyond, and she shows her range into dirt comedy and psychological drama without batting an eye, like a champ.
The "angry jerk" routine gets old pretty fast, but it shifts throughout the movie so it's not unbearable, and for every ounce Raunch gives, Haley Lu Richardson comes back with "happy idiot" and it's a wonderful juxtaposition.
Special mention to Sebastian Stan for helping Melissa Rauch with one of the most amazing sex scenes I've ever seen, and it's not even about it being dirty. It was as beautiful and funny as it was sexy.
The movie is funny, but it does feel as if you're laughing in spite of the movie, and its a special kind of dark humor.
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This bronze deserves gold!
This an entertaining dramedy or dark comedy, whatever you wish to brand it, but the important thing is that you can enjoy a superb perfomance by Melissa Rauch showing that she can do characters totally opposite from her popular character in The Big Bang Theory. Here, in The Bronze, she gives life to the believable character of Hope Ann Gregory developing a great story of redemption.
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Too bad it isn't nearly as funny as it is raunchy
"The Bronze" (2016 release; 108 min.) brings the story of Hope Ann Greggory. As the movie opens, we see footage of her at a young age trying to do cartwheels and other gymnastic related things. It's not long before we see her competing at the 2004 Rome Olympics, where, at age 17 and despite a severe foot injury, she manages, very much Kerri Strug-like in the 1996 Atlanta Olympics, to complete her final landing to salvage a bronze medal and instantly becoming America's sweetheart, most of all to her home town of Amherst, Ohio. Now, 12 years later, Hope has become an insufferable woman, obsessed with her moment of glory. But then, she gets an opportunity to coach up-and-coming gymnast Maggie Townsend, also from Amherst. At this point we're 15 min. into the movie, but to tell you more would spoil your viewing experience, you'll just have to see for yourself how it all plays out.
Couple of comments: while directed by Bryan Buckley and this is a Duplass Brothers Production, this is a Melissa Rauch movie all the way. Best known for her long-running role on TV's The Big Bang Theory. she stars as Hope, and she co-wrote the scripts (with her husband Winston Rauch). Almost from the get-go, the Hope character is so unlikeable, self-absorbed and rude that it frankly affects the way one can enjoy the movie. "I'm not a coach, I'm a star, I was in Dancing with the Stars, not Dancing with the Coaches!", Hope yells at her dad when the idea of her coaching initially comes up. What really surprised me what how raunchy the movie turned out to be. There is almost non-stop cussing and crude language. It's a shame that the movie isn't nearly as funny as it is raunchy. I will admit that there is one sex scene that is quite hilarious. It seems to me this movie is one big missed opportunity. You can see the potential, but it rarely materializes. There is some great song placements in the movie, including Britney Spears' "Work B**ch", Ace of Base, and others. And check out the song that plays over the movie's end titles, performed by Melissa Rauch herself and at her raunchiest yet...
You may have heard that "The Bronze", which opened wide (defined as over 1,000 screens) last weekend, completely bombed at the box office, and then some. It was one of the worst openings EVER for a wide release, and it's easy to see why. I had seen the trailer and was intrigued. The weekday evening screening where I saw this at here in Cincinnati turned out to be a private screening: I was literally the only person in the theater. I must say that the potential shown in the trailer never materialized in the movie itself. A darn shame.
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"The Bronze" couldn't even win bronze in a 2-way competition.
July 23, 1996. Atlanta, Georgia. The Women's Gymnastics Team Finals. The American women had never won team gold. They were, however, slightly ahead of the Russian team heading into the last rotation in the team competition. American gymnast Dominique Moceanu failed to stick the landing on either of her vault attempts. Then, her teammate Kerri Strug also fell – and injured her ankle. With the Russians performing in the floor exercise event at the same time, the competition between the two teams was so close that the American women's coach, Béla Károlyi, told Strug that they needed her to make her second vault to secure the gold medal. Strug limped to the start of her approach, then she sprinted down the mat, sprung over the vault and… stuck the landing! Strug then began hopping on her good leg as she saluted the judges before collapsing to the mat in pain. She had to be helped off the mat and later carried by Károlyi to the medal stand. U.S. Women's Gymnastics had their first team gold in Olympic history and Kerri Strug was a national hero. It's this story that inspired "The Bronze" (R, 1:48), but that's all that Strug's heroic act of self-sacrifice has in common with this embarrassment of a movie.
At the 2004 Summer Olympics, American gymnast Hope Annabelle Greggory (Melissa Rauch, from TV's "The Big Bang Theory") suffered an injury during the Women's Team Competition, but still managed to perform in her final event, helping the U.S. to a team bronze. She spent the next dozen years in her small hometown of Amherst, Ohio (30 miles west of Cleveland) living off her fifteen minutes of fame, in the home of her devoted widowed father (Gary Cole), depending on him for most of her support. She also gets free meals at the mall food court, has a reserved parking space in front of the town diner and she wears her USA warm-up suit everywhere. Hope's glory days – correction, glory day is an Olympic-sized cow and she is milk-ing-it! This might not be so bad if she were a decent person, but she's rude, foul-mouthed, promiscuous, dumb, self-centered and meanest to those who care about her the most.
Certain circumstances arise that convince Hope to train another rising Amherst gymnast by the name of Maggie Townsend (Haley Lu Richardson) and make sure she's prepared for the upcoming Olympics. This puts Hope back in contact with an awkward, but sweet local guy named Ben (Thomas Middleditch) who co-owns the gym where Hope is training Maggie – and back in conflict with an old enemy, former Olympic Men's Gymnastics Gold Medal Winner Lance Tucker (Sebastian Stan) who is now a fellow Olympic Women's Gymnastics coach. Besides clashing with Lance and being mean to Ben, Hope's jaded and selfish personality contrasts greatly with Maggie's innocent enthusiasm, but Maggie and her hard-working single mother (SNL's Cecily Strong) are grateful to have her services. Hope herself ends up having more at stake in this scenario than she ever imagined – including her own hometown hero status.
"The Bronze" is rarely funny and often ridiculous. In the hands of more talented comedic actresses, this might have been an entertaining movie, but as it stands, Hope's steady stream of profanities, unladylike antics and self-aggrandizing behavior just come across as comedy by pummeling. (Or maybe, given this movie's subject matter, comedy by… pommeling.) The script, written by the film's star and her husband, Winston Rauch, is content to portray hope as an unlikeable, one-dimensional character through most of the movie and first-time feature film director Bryan Buckley (known mostly for short films and Super Bowl commercials) is unable to tease much that is worthwhile out of his actors or the script. Worse yet, he allows some of his main characters to speak in an accent that I have never heard anywhere between the Ohio River and Lake Erie, and the only well-directed action in the movie is not on the mat, but in a graphic sex scene late in the movie that feels dropped in out of nowhere. Propped up by only a few laughs and a little sweetness, this film couldn't even win bronze in a two-movie competition. "D"
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The Bronze is a winner
Really nice surprise this turned out to be, I had seen the trailer and thought it seemed like good mindless fun the rating was a bit low (currently at 5.9) so I wasn't too sure just how good it would be.
But I must say that it exceeded my expectation, and what I thought would be some mindless fun actually turned out to have plenty of substance to go along with the gags.
The lead-character is played by Melissa Rauch, someone who I never had heard of prior to this but she plays the role perfectly with a lot of attitude and even though she is pretty self-centred somehow she still manages to make her character likable.
I was surprised to see that she actually wrote the script herself (together with her husband) so that's even more impressive.
The plot albeit familiar manages to feel really refreshing and does well at not landing itself in cliché-land, which is more than one can say about most sports-movies.
But then this is more than just a sports-movie.
Really good performances from the rest of the cast as well, notably Gary Cole and Thomas Middleditch. And some really nice cinematography as well, especially the gymnastic-scenes.
Oh and the soundtrack fits perfect for the movie as well.
So yeah definitely worth a watch, if you don't mind f-bombs and adult humour of which there is plentiful here.
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needs to be sharper
Warning: Spoilers
In 2004, Hope Ann Greggory overcomes an injury to earn an Olympic Bronze medal and becomes the national hero of the Games. In the present, she (Melissa Rauch) is a foul-mouthed, mail-stealing, pill-snorting mess living off of her past glory with her widower mailman father Stan (Gary Cole) as the biggest name in her hometown of Amherst, Ohio. When her former coach dies, she receives the suicide letter promising an inheritance of $500k if she takes over coaching Maggie Townsend (Haley Lu Richardson) to the upcoming Olympics in Toronto. Ben Lawfort (Thomas Middleditch) co-owns the gym with the late coach who Hope derisively calls Twitchy for his facial ticks. Maggie has a struggling single mom Janice (Cecily Strong). Lance Tucker (Sebastian Stan) is the national coach who has a history with Hope.
This is a dark comedy that needs a few rewrites to clean up the character's emotional journey. The outline is fine and Hope is a good dark character. I like all the actors. There is some good material here but the humor is not up to snuff. Melissa plays the one-note well. Haley is cute and has good chemistry with Melissa. Thomas Middleditch is a doll and the romance is cute. This is fine but it needs to be sharper.
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Raunch from Rauch
Greetings again from the darkness. Leave it to the Duplass brothers (Executive Producers here) to turn the traditional sports movie genre upside down. Of course, this is about as much of a sports movie as Dodgeball: A True Underdog Story, but it does use the backdrop of the Olympics to make a point about fading fame. Mostly though, it's an excuse to crack wise, spew profanities and spoil anything and anyone remotely innocent.
Melissa Rauch (Bernadette on "The Big Bang Theory") stars as Hope, a former bronze medalist in Women's gymnastics, who captured the hearts of Americans when she battled through an Achilles injury to perform her final event. The movie picks up a decade after Hope's Olympic heroics and we first see her enjoying a clip of her big moment. And by enjoying, I mean … well, never mind. It turns out Hope never was able to compete again, and instead continues to milk her celebrity status around small town Amherst, Ohio. When her dad (Gary Cole) gently nudges her to take a coaching job, she shouts "I'm a star, not a coach!" Hope is a selfish brat whose egoism has her clinging to former glory and preventing her from joining society.
Hope gets tricked into coaching Maggie, the town's up-and-coming gymnastics prodigy. Maggie (Haley Lu Richardson) idolizes Hope and is her polar opposite in every possible personality trait – a very welcome upbeat and perky addition to the movie. Instead of embracing the opportunity, Hope goes out of her way to sabotage naïve Maggie's dream. Along the way, she also mistreats the gym owner who somehow fancies her – despite Hope's hopelessness. Twitchy Ben (Thomas Middleditch) is a sweet guy who sees the good in Hope and does his best to pull her from the dark side.
A twist of fate places Hope at odds with her old flame and former Olympic gold medalist, Lance (Sebastian Stan), who is now a leader in the world of women's gymnastics. These two banter like siblings who dislike each other, and also execute one of the wackiest ever on-screen comedic sex scenes – for all of you who have fantasized about frolicking with a gymnast.
Director Bryan Buckley is best known for his 50-plus TV commercials that have aired during Super Bowls, but here he lets Melissa Rauch do her thing (she also co-wrote the script with her husband Winston Rauch). There is some commentary on fame and celebrity (and cameos from Olga Korbut, Dominique Dawes, Dominique Moceanu), and some insight into narcissism; but mostly it's a chance for Ms. Rauch to flaunt her foul motor-mouth with some extremely crass and raunchy lines. It's kind of cute in an absurdly profane way, and some might agree it beats watching real gymnastics.
Note: Including a Doris Day song on this film's soundtrack may be the funniest, or at least most ironic moment.
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Give it a shiny silver for its heart and ultimately sincere portrayal of a troubled character
"The Bronze" opens with Melissa Rauch's cranky and unapologetically vulgar character Hope Ann Greggory fiercely masturbating to a videotape of her perfectly executing a complex gymnastics routine while injured to be awarded the bronze medal at a gymnastics competition in Toronto in 2004. That is probably the most seriously any spectator has ever taken gymnastics in history. That was twelve years ago, but that fact does little to phase her. She still parades around her small, podunk town of Amherst, Ohio in her USA outfit owning her celebrity status, as she is a regular at a local mall and the diner where she never pays for anything and has drink and food specials in her honor.
Hope lives with her father Stan (Gary Cole), a geeky postman who's only companion is his goldfish Bradley. Stan is tired of Hope constantly lying around with no sense of responsibility and no prospects to get employed or seek employment. However, when her former gymnastics coach commits suicide, right in the middle of training Maggie Townsend (Haley Lu Richardson), who is looking to surpass Hope in the Olympics, the offer of Hope's lifetime comes - her deceased coach offers her a will of $500,000 if she trains Maggie to as far as she can go. Appropriately, Hope smacks her gum, shrugs her shoulders, curses a bit, and goes back to her room to sulk.
Upon initially meeting Maggie, Hope decides to steer her off course of her rigorous training, by getting her to indulge in boys and an unconscionable amount of fast food. After mixing government-grade marijuana in her protein shake leads her to performing poorly in front of the coordinator, a former acquaintance and partner of Hope's, Hope winds up getting serious about training Maggie to go for gold. Some of it is because she wants to remain relevant in the eyes of the public, a small part of it is to stick it to her old flame, but most of it is for the money.
Melissa Rauch is absolutely excellent here; after riding a recurring role on CBS's "Big Bang Theory" for many years, she has the ability to break out and prove what she can do in a starring role. Her fiercely confident screen presence is noticeable from the very beginning, and her crass and vulgar seems to genuinely come from her personality rather than her momentary desire to be crude, which is so very rare, yet a subtle difference maker when it comes to comedies. Most films have actors, Robert De Niro in "Dirty Grandpa" and Rebel Wilson in "How to Be Single," as of late are thrust into these kind of compromising positions and are forced to subject themselves to mindless antics.
Maybe it's because she's a co-writer, but Rauch winds up getting a lot of strong freedom in the way of physicality (particularity during a raunchy, acrobatic sex scene) and dialog-driven humor, where she sells her ability to be both youthful and high-spirited so very well. With just one movie role, she sits comfortably alongside the likes of Tina Fey, Amy Poehler, and Greta Gerwig for most interesting actresses.
Because of Rauch's wonderful performance, "The Bronze" really proves that it's more about the vulgar and black comedy it so cheerfully concocts; it's about a person trying to remain relevant and, as a result, remaining stuck in a state of listlessness and no ambition. Even as unlikable as Hope can be, it's clear how unhappy she is as a person; she's not just mean-spirited for the sake of being mean-spirited. Rauch and her husband Winston, who serves as co-writer, are sure to concoct plenty of uproariously funny sequences involving Hope trying to train Maggie and operate as a responsible coach, but the underlying sadness of her character's situation isn't lost on them, which makes "The Bronze" much better than what it could've been.
Compare the film to "The Brothers Grimsby," the new, desperately unfunny Sacha Baron Cohen film, which predicates itself on gross-out humor that gets its nowhere and leaves it an empty shell of a comedy. There's no substance and no staying power after you see it. "The Bronze" cares enough about its character to give it some sort of life outside of what is expected of a silly, springtime comedy, and has enough respect for its leading actress to give her a wickedly funny showcase of her talent.
NOTE: After premiering at Sundance in January 2015, "The Bronze" was expected to be released into theaters shortly after, but had distribution conflicts with Relativity filing for bankruptcy, resulting in the film being picked up by Sony Pictures Classics and Jay and Mark Duplass's production company (which is so fitting when you think about it) for a semi-wide release this month. Without the help of some loyal movie cultists and some generally optimistic souls, I'm afraid this film may not have a chance to reach the audience it deserves.
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Box Office Results Aside...
...this is still a pretty bad film.
I hate to bash a low-budget indie flick like this, because it's obvious everyone in the cast is trying their best... It's just not funny.
I'm not a fan of 'Big Bang Theory' so I have no familiarity with the lead actress, but it's clear she was going for a Danny McBride-esque tone for the main character. Unfortunately, NOTHING about this character comes off as lovable, or even likable, so there's not a single moment in the film in which you root for her. This is a fundamental problem in storytelling that is forgivable in most "wacky" comedies (because, honestly, who *really* cares about character in that genre?) IF they managed to disguise the problem with hilarious set pieces. This movie didn't. The "raunchy" jokes felt awkward/out of place and most just fell completely flat.
It just wasn't funny.
I'm not surprised at all this didn't find an audience. I'm sure it'll perform better on DVD, but even then I can't recommend it.
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Much Better Than Critics Will Have you Believe
As someone who has actually seen this movie and liked it, I feel a responsibility in taking it under my wing to protect it from some of the unfair criticism it's received. I think some people don't want Melissa Rausch to succeed because she's already a wildly popular TV star and they are punishing her. Some people are actually delighted that it's doing poorly at the box office.
I don't say this movie is a 10 (how many movies are) but its certainly enjoyable and original. While you can label it a comedy,it's more appreciated as a character study of Hope Greggory, a former bronze medal gymnast who had to cut her career short due to an injury and has put her life on hold ever since. I'm sorry if this has turned into more of a rant instead of a review but I'm just not understanding why it's being panned when this is a pretty good movie. Melissa is very talented and versatile and has a great career ahead of her after Big Bang Theory.
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a bad Napolean Dynamite
I knew i wanted to see this film the minute i saw the previews. Like the title states, this is a pretty low budget film which is very similar to two Jon Heder films we've already seen, Napolean Dynamite and Blades of Glory. BUT this is very raunchy. I hadn't seen nor heard bad language like this since Hot tub Time Machine 2. But the film is fun to watch, and we see the dehabilitating effects drugs has on individuals.So as the story goes, there is a gymnast who had competed in the Olympics...not the 2002 Salt lake City ones, but 2004 if I remember correctly. This girl, the gymnast ends up winning a Bronze medal..hence what the title of this film is. Well, her coach dies and influences her in a letter to take the protégé that she had been training onto and into a compettitive level as good as she herself had once been.And thats where the film becomes even more interesting, not to mention that some of the stars are virtual unknowns...one of the top billings is an actor that stars in HBO's Silicon Valley.
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Very annoying but yet amuzing character to watch.
Although the main character is one of those characters you immediately hate and wish something really bad happens to, you kinda grow into it and start to find it very entertaining to watch. Melissa Rauch (actress and writer in The Bronze) did a great job playing her foul-mouthed character. Something totally different than that girl she plays in The Big Bang Theory. Not that I know her from that show as I find it incredibly irritating to watch, but we've all seen a glimpse of it while zapping as it seems to be on television forever. The cast in The Bronze is rather small but they all did well. The nude sex scene between the two gymnasts was to me the best scene from this movie, very funny and acrobatical, to say the least. Actually one of the better sex scenes ever in a comedy. Gymnastics, not really the sport I enjoy to watch in real, but in this movie it was certainly amuzing. But if you're into gymnastics I would certainly give this one a go.
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The Bronze Review
It's a good cast and the story is fun. The movie does't try to be more that it is.
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Source: https://www.imdb.com/title/tt3859304/reviews
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