Jockey

Just as the title suggests, Jockey is the title of a horse jockey in Clint Bentley’s impressive debut feature that made its premiere at the 2021 Sundance Film Festival. A film about an aging and fragile horse rider who finds his career coming to an end due to deteriorating health. With a new horse, the rider named Jackson (Clifton Collins Jr.) doesn’t give up, and regardless of how cliche or sentimental it might sound, he attempts to prepare and race in a big championship before his decay.

A gripping comeback story about a washed-up athlete defying all odds may sound cliche, sentimental, or even like a trite crowd pleaser, but it ends up being anything but. Bentley’s film, whose film is more in the vein of Chloe Zhao’s elegiac The Rider and Darren Aronofsky’s The Wrestler, is a very emotionally raw, heartbreaking glimpse into how it feels to face the reality of a career-ending due to health issues. Instead of feeling cloy or manipulative, filmmaker Bentley, who also co-wrote the script with Greg Kwedar, uses the film in the vein of a Robert Bresson approach, creating an observational, more visually poetic, and docudrama style that feels more emotionally visceral by showcasing a deeply flawed character that you still care about.

Bentley’s debut film also feels very vivid about the horse racing lifestyle. Clifton Collins Jr. (Traffic, Capote), a veteran actor who has mostly played supporting roles throughout his career, gets the opportunity to play the lead and delivers one of the most powerful performances of 2021, as well as a career-defining one for Collins Jr. He plays Jackson Silva, who begins to periodically lose feeling in his right arm and avoids the doctors as much as he can. His main focus is to have one final race with a new horse that holds a lot of potential–and he also has the opportunity to become a mentor to a young jockey who could possibly be the son he never knew he had.

The film’s setting is in Pheonix, and Bentley captures the horse-riding world so authentically with his docudrama style. Aesthetically and visually, the film’s cinematography by Adolpho Veloso also feels like the style of Chloe Zhao since most of it is shot in desert landscapes during twilight, which helps give the film a more elegiac feeling. The film spends most of its time with Jackson around other fellow riders and jockeys as they hang out in mobile homes, local bars, group sessions, diners, and tack rooms. Jackson is clearly the most respected horse rider in his band of fellow jockeys and trainers. He also has a strong friendship with Ruth (Molly Parker), a veteran trainer who recently invested in a thoroughbred horse that should give Jackson a stronger edge on the horse tracks. Meanwhile, Jackson’s health begins to decline. He has had his back broken three times throughout his career, and it’s now starting to catch up to him. He feels weak and has a hard time losing weight, but he keeps these details hidden from Ruth as Jackson gets advice from the track doctor, who informs him to seek further medical attention.

Jackson ends up growing suspicions about a young jockey named Gabriel (Moises Arias), whose word keeps getting back to Jackson that he’s following him from track to track. Jackson ends up confronting him at a dinner, where Gabrial informs Jackson that he’s, his son. Jackson isn’t convinced of this and quickly dismisses the idea of it. As Jackson’s health continues to degrade, he ends up valuing life more by the day and decides to start mentoring Gabriel. Jackson’s entire livelihood has always been on the track. That’s all he really knows, and during other races, he sees great potential in Gabriel as a jockey. It’s there that Jackson begins to see the possibility that Gabriel could very well be his son, and that he can train him further to pass the torch so his horse racing legacy can live on.

Newcomer Bentley never stages horse races in a conventional way. The most we see of the horses is in tight close-ups of Gabrial and Jackson riding on the track as dirt flings by their faces. The film is less about the racing and more about the internal conflict the characters face. Even though the script and narrative have all the ingredients of feeling romanticized or sentimental, this is more of a film that is brutally honest with its details, in a milieu that examines a subculture where people put their bodies on the line, and the average spectator doesn’t realize the amount of skill and endurance it requires to ride a horse. The film triumphs in its artistry. The aesthetics and setting of mostly twilight skies give the film a euphoric tone. The film’s score by Bryce Dessner and Aaron Dessner of the indie rock band The National delivers the most memorable score of 2021. The score helps give the film a more woozy and somber tone that matches the ravishing landscapes and captures Jackson’s state of mind.

The real showcase here is Clifton Collins Jr., who proves he has the skill to carry an entire picture. After years of being a supporting player in many roles where he was more of a character actor, with Jockey he’s given a great amount of emotional depth and he meets all of the emotional demands of the role. The result is a very commanding performance that captures the characters’ desolate state of being and anxieties about not being able to horse ride again. In the end, Jockey is a heartbreaking and deeply moving portrait of leaving a legacy. The film doesn’t miss one false note, moment by moment, until its very satisfying conclusion, which is filled with genuine expression and dignity.