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This is a poignant outstanding film from Chris Bell that has a focus on the steroid issues and some of the broader implications around that. This film is taking more of a pro and con position that does dig deep on the issue. The footage itself is quite compelling and the editing on this film was also mint. Chris for a large part of the film serves as the interviewer and narrator. He is in a family of brothers that got into weight lifting, but two of his brothers took it further and imbibe in steroids as an enhancer. It is amazing in seeing the film how many tie ins there are to the issue and how even muscle supplements commonly seen in health food stores lack regulation and maybe information to the user that can be assimilated into anything logical and coherent.. The film takes a listening tone and gives a hearing to both sides and many sides of the issue. The overall visuals on this film are quite compelling in terms of depicting a wider and maybe somewhat chaotic outer culture that doesn't have an overall foothold on this and related issues. A couple of doctors who have a pro steroid tone and position are given fairly ample screen time and some of what they said was that the side effects are tolerable and reversible if they show up. This kind of doctor, can exhibit an arrogance of the profession, where they seem to proceed where they seem to be so sure. This is also part of the general problem, where the so called expert is given to much leeway and latitude, and the listener is to a degree playing dumb and given all power of attorney so to speak to the so called expert, this doctor who has read medical books and obtained a medical degree. At least in this area of steroid use, there is obviously too much deference to doctors who are pro. Someone would only need a basic understanding of medical terms to read and research the topic themselves, yet it seems that so many might be skipping that process and deferring to what they hear. The amount for example of the steroid testosterone that is given is often in the range of ten times what the body normally produces naturally. If someone was in that situation from a medical problem, the doctors would be doing something to correct this back to the normal range. It would be illogical to think that giving a hormone in the amounts of ten times, could possibly not have significant and possible unknown harmful effects on the body given an even rudimentary understanding of hormonal balances needed by the body. And then the experts say the steroid rage is only 5 in a hundred, but even if that is true, is that fair to someone who is in the path of the rage, the potential innocent bystander here or there that has been unleashed upon by medical science. In truth, steroids hasn’t been around long enough and anybody taking them now is an experiment for the effects which are still unknown long term. One scene shows Barry Bonds telling reporters that they have all lied. This footage seems to have Barry saying that he also lied, so everybody lied.Seems like a clever decoy that just doesn't answer the core question of his own culpability. It also seems like a quasi admission of guilt on the now all time home run leader, who had break out years under the speculation that he may have used steroids. Chris’s interviews with his brothers seem to portray them as somewhat lost in their decisions to take things further and use steroids, but at the same time, why should the viewer be sympathetic to a choice that can be immediately stopped and hasn't been pushed upon them by outsiders. Nobody in this film seems to have been forced to take steroids, although that must have happened in certain times and places. Michael Johnson who was stripped of a gold medal for a world record 100 in the Olympics after testing positive for steroids, was interviewed one on one with Chris and what he had to say was quite interesting. What becomes particularly mint about the film is the way it blends larger related stories into the immediate concern about steroids and where this steroid usage is taking particular individuals and widespread sections of society. To a degree everybody at the moment seems to be having a good time so why stop a good thing? But one of the issues that is related is just how much society is performance oriented for just about everything you could think of. There is such a thing as talent in sports, and can that talent be found and enjoyed as is without tying it totally to performance and results. There are other correlates which are shown in this film, how college students pop pills that help them focus on late night papers or cramming for exams, another end justifying the means and also another example of self exploration with artificial means. Some of the weight lifters shown here have tremendous results that would come about probably only if someone actually lived in a gym and worked out all their waking hours. But then advertisements show that they get the girl. Chris Bell himself at times seems almost like a last bastion, interviewing people that have already gone above and beyond and it seems like he is the only one around who has held off and can still ask logcial questions. Then, the question coalesces around the issue of who is the “keeper of the guard”. In fact is anybody left anywhere that would attempt to put a stop on this as everybody seems to have taking a dive into the pool? Footage shows a fumbling congressman who headed the steroid hearings but is unsure of many of the surrounding facts at hand as Chris attempts to get him to say something significant in the one on one. It does seem for now that society as a whole will proceed on this. Baseball players do have mammoth contracts waiting for them at the first sign of success, but why does the use go into so many side sports like cycling, swimming, running and other purist pursuits, where it used to be partly for the joy of the sport? News reports draw conclusions off stories that are largely speculative and really pose stories that are also lacking objectivity because it isn't there in the first place. Who knows really what prompted either illnesses or rages of these steroid users and what else could also be a viable explanation for what happened. One side thing that is irritating is the person of Jose Conseco, who lied about using steriods for decades as an MVP baseball player and now he is given full tilt about telling the truth about his comrades. This is now an honest man? Reformed for us? Or for his ongoing profiteering now at the expense of others reputations. There is almost like a mad march here that reminds someone of looking for the perfect or more perfect group and person. At the same time, these physical specimens are impressive and you wonder how much of it would in fact actually still be there and still be quite visible even without the steroids? As a view, you do get the impression that taking these steroids on an ongoing basis is kind of a leap into the dark, like maybe jumping as a high jumper or diver, without properly checking the waters that one is taking that vast leap into. At least make sure the water is deep enough, that there are no impediments nearby and so on. Chris does at the end of the movie, attempt a tie together, where it is George C. Scott as Patton and America must win at all costs that summarizes the rush to steroids en mass. However it contradicts scenes earlier in the movie where steroids was part of keeping up with the Russians and whatever the explanation for widespread steroid use, I would say no way to the we are the best American idea. Steroids are not as American as apple pie and the link might be more so that American expertise is supposed to be the best and this includes medical expertise that is subsequently imaged and blindly followed. But the win mentality couldn’t possible explain all this and it is more so a planetary problem. His interview with one of his brothers does contain one helpful hint that may be a small part of the picture where the brother says that he must stand out in some way. And this may be his one and only route from his point of view to being able to stand out in a significant way. The money time and effort spent on all this seems like a lot for something that is probably going to boomerang back like a freight train even if that train isn’t coming for a while yet. At the same time, nearing the end of this movie, I was thinking I hadn’t been to the gym in more than a week and I better get going and get some tone and augment my naturally strong genetics. The audience in this NYC Theater really enjoyed the film and clapped at the end and it is well worth seeing just for the entertainment aspects alone.
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