A trailer has been released for the forthcoming film, The Program, which is a biographical film on Lance Armstrong. The film is directed by Stephen Frears who previously directed The Queen and Philomena.
The film features Ben Foster in the lead role as the disgraced cyclist, with Chris O’Dowd playing David Walsh, the Irish journalist who plays a significant part in uncovering the web of lies. The film is based on Walsh’s book, Seven Deadly Sins and the script is written by John Hodge, best known for Trainspotting and The Sweeney. The cast also includes Dustin Hoffman, and Guillaume Canet..
The trailer gives a taste of what the film will look like, with recreation of cycling scenes, press conferences and various doping scenes. Despite painstaking recreation of the bikes from that era by Condor Cycles, it seems that the recreation of the maillot jaune shown in the trailer hasn’t been shown the same level of attention to detail.
This is what director Frears had to say about the film, as reported on ING:
“In terms of how [Lance Armstrong] conducted his behavior, he’s discussed how he’s made his mistakes, and whether or not he can make good on them now is not for me to decide. In terms of his athletic ability, there aren’t many like him. That’s a combination of focus,” Foster said last year. “It’s as much will as being a physical body. He’s one of the greatest athletes that’s ever lived. He came up in a time of doping, and it’s my opinion, if you look at the statistics, you have to go down 17 or 18 guys for those seven years retroactively, at least, to find a clean rider. So it wasn’t EPO [Erythropoietin] that made Lance the greatest cyclist. It was something far bigger. How he handled that ability, how he handled his will, that story’s not over yet.”
The Program has been in production for at least two years and is due for release towards the end of the year. More details can be found on the film’s official website at www.theprogrammovie.com.
