Review: In from the Side (2022)

 

 This one gave me a bit of whiplash.

Media type: Live action film, romantic drama

 Amount watched: Completed 

Genre: drama

Rating of sport/s in media: 7/10

Rating of movie overall: 5/10

I want to be kinder to this movie. Pretty much every shot is beautiful, even scenes that could be boring on park benches, bedrooms and B-roll of our characters traveling. The most beautiful scenes in this film are the actual rugby, of which there is far too little. And I say this as someone who is completely comfortable, and even often supportive, of limiting the amount of actual sporting shown in live-action sports movies and television shows.

I am going to attempt to write a spoiler-free synopsis, but that will be difficult since you can absolutely guess where this story is going from a one-sentence summary.

This movie is about two members of a local all-queer rugby team having an affair.

Now, there are stories about infidelity that end as you would expect, but are still absolutely worth the journey. I wouldn't say this is one of them.

Our main character, a second team rugby player named Mark, played by Alexander Lincoln, is often the least interesting performance on the screen, with the exception of his affair partner and first team member Warren, played by Alexander King. Mark is very pretty and handsome, and he gives a fantastic pout, but even when his life and Warren's life is falling apart, there just isn't much there.

I honestly can't completely tell if this is just a weakness in their acting, or because both Mark and Warren are the least interesting characters in the whole movie. Really every other member of their club, and even Mark's parents, are written with more depth. Even Mark's boyfriend, who we hardly see, is more engaging.

Christopher Sherwood, Pearse Egan, William Hearle and Chris Garner all put on wonderful performances in the limited amount of screen time made available to them.

Sherwood and Hearle in particular stole every scene.

And any of their characters would have been a more interesting focal point. If In from the Side was a television show instead of a movie, Mark and Warren's very dull though hot and horny affair would be a perfect C plot that explodes at the end of the second season, rearranging all the characters around them.

But no.

The whiplash from the film, for me at least, comes from whether or not this is really a sports movie. It very much is one at the start, then we pretty much completely abandon the importance of rugby. These two could have been members of any kind of fraternal organization or special interest club.

Why does this matter? Let me give some other examples of sport mattering to plot. In Heated Rivalry the main characters don't need to be hockey players, but they do need to be professional athletes at the top of a sport. In Stick, Owen Wilson's character doesn't necessarily need to be a golfer, but he does need to play an individual sport with a circuit. In The Sandlot, the kids don't need to play baseball, but they need something active where they can all participate and where something, not necessarily a ball but another mcguffin if not a baseball, goes over the fence.

But at the end of In from the Side, after ignoring the rugby for the vast majority of the movie, it once again becomes the main focus out of nowhere. 'This is what it was all really about the whole time', the movie tries to proclaim. And, okay, I guess it makes that case. But it is cut down a bit by Warren's story line. Perhaps we're supposed to see Warren's ending as a contrast to Mark, but for me it just didn't really settle that way.

I would happily, dreamily watch the rugby scenes in this movie over and over again. I truly feel that the director loves the sport. I just wish he'd picked a different member of this particular club as his focus.