Film
Battle of the Sexes
- Director
- Jonathan Dayton, Valerie Faris
- Certificate
- 12A
- Running Time
- 121 mins
You may be forgiven for thinking you’ve already seen this one, as the same title was used for a 2013 TV documentary on the subject. Nonetheless, this lightly feminist crowd-pleaser whisks us back to that always enjoyable peak male chauvinist piggery of the 1970s.
It’s 1973, to be precise. Boorish 55-year-old retired Wimbledon tennis champ Bobby Riggs (Steve Carell, beneath an amusing wig) asserts to anyone who’ll listen that women belong in the kitchen and that he can beat any of the current female champions. Billie Jean King (La La Land‘s Emma Stone, behind unflattering specs) takes him up on the challenge for a big televised exhibition match. Everyone knows how this ends, so the Little Miss Sunshine directing duo of Jonathan Dayton and Valerie Faris take the opportunity to delve into the backgrounds of both competitors: Riggs’s desperation to reignite his career and married King’s coming to terms with her sexuality (enter hottie hairdresser Andrea Riseborough).
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