It is the 1980s and Nike is one of the top movers of runner’s wear, but their basketball division is in the final stages of being budgeted out of existence unless they can get some strong player endorsements.  Sonny Vaccaro (Matt Damon) has his back against the wall knowing that they cannot split the budget to afford a star player, so he pulls some strings to place the entire budget on one up-and-coming player: Michael Jordan.  Not only will he have to convince marketing director Rob Strasser (Jason Bateman), Jordan’s agent David Falk (Chris Messina), and the CEO of Nike Phil Knight (Ben Affleck), but he will also need to win over the matriarch of the Jordan family, Deloris (Viola Davis).  His stubborn persistence pays off because without this deal, the Air Jordan, one of the most popular shoes in the world, would never have come to market. 

Ben Affleck returns to the director’s seat with Air, a script penned by freshman screenwriter Alex Convery and the first film from Amazon Studios in this new era of commitment towards supporting theatrical releases before debuting their films on Prime.  The 111-minute film peeks behind the curtain at one of the world’s most recognizable sports brands, but it is not a traditional origin story of scrappy big thinkers trying to lay the foundation for their business.  Rather, it plays more like Bennett Miller’s Moneyball (2011) which followed Brad Pitt as Billy Beane when he redefined the drafting process leading up to the 2002 season of Major League Baseball; a disruption within the establishment. 

Narratively speaking, biopics and docudramas always have an uphill battle when it comes to creating tension as the audience may already come into the film with facts about the subject muting any chance of surprise or twists of fate.  Air, seeking to tackle one of the most popular product lines from one of the most recognizable brands, means that Convery has his work cut out for him; a task he meets with middling success.  Whereas Moneyball shed some light on a practice that audiences may have known little about, even those who have never stepped foot onto a basketball court after high school gym class surely have seen – and possibly even worn – a pair of Air Jordans.  In this way, Convery is facing many of the same challenges that Robert Siegel did when he penned The Founder (2016) which chronicled the rise of McDonald’s from a small, family-run, burger stand into one of the world’s leading fast-food restaurants.  Where the two scripts differ is that Siegel’s film was much more focused on the humans behind the brand, and though there are glimmers of that in Convery’s script, he struggles to humanize both the brand and the modern legend that is Michael Jordan. 

One of the main ways he brings Jordan down to size is through the benefit of the time period before he became a household name, but the choice was also made to never show Jordan except from behind and even then, only in the briefest of flashes.  It becomes almost comical in nature as the camera skirts around Damian Delano Young, the stand-in for Jordan, and while it makes sense as this is not specifically Jordan’s story, it all feels rather clumsy.  Even for a film that is trying to have fun with itself, this is a bridge too far and it does not match the tone of the overall picture.  It is a small thing, but it is so overtly done that it quickly draws audiences out of the immersion. 

Affleck as the director is playing it very safe for this outing, almost to its detriment, that even though Damon is enjoyable to watch, there is little lightning here.  Air is a much calmer film from the director who has mounted some incredible bank heist sequences, war zone extractions, and gritty hostage exchanges in the past.  What he does do is make sure the film has its own visual identity separate from his other works, though an 80s corporate office is not a very exciting visual tone to adopt.  The film is also incredibly singular in its location, possibly for budgetary reasons but also the nature of the story being told does not easily lend itself to breaking out from Nike’s walls, but Affleck’s utilization of the space he is given leaves much to be desired.  The biggest flaw of the film lies in that the actual creation of the Air Jordan is pushed into a sequence so short and immediate that it hardly feels like the team behind it created something revolutionary.  Sure, at that point, no one in Nike had any clue just how massive this brand would become, but the script operates with such foresight in everything else surrounding Jordan and the impact he would have on the sport, it is a shame we do not get that same excitement around the actual product. 

As mentioned, Damon is perfectly serviceable in the role as the one that brings the ensemble together, and it is in the ensemble cast where Air shines.  Affleck fills the role of a punching bag as Phil Knight, the CEO of the newly public company with a truly awful haircut and gaudy 80s fashion.  By taking the brunt of any jokes that punch down, he allows for the rest of the cast to interact and shine together.  Bateman, like Damon, is not reinventing himself in Air, but instead has a laser focus to ensure his jokes hit with 100% accuracy.  Chris Tucker as Howard White, and Messina bring bombastic energy to the film drawing eyes towards them with every scene which they are carefully and sparingly used so as not to be overdone.  Matthew Maher as Peter Moore, the engineer behind the shoe, is shoved into a very brief and thankless role, and with a little retooling around the development of the Air Jordan, not only would Maher been given more to do, but the film would have been greatly improved. 

With all that talent, Air has one more name on the call sheet that adds a bit of legitimacy to it.  As Deloris Jackson, Viola Davis lends herself to the film, a casting choice reportedly mandated by Michael Jordan himself.  Because the film actively distances itself from the young Jordan, Deloris becomes the main negotiator with Nike.  As expected, Davis is not phoning it in and helps to inject some humanity into the otherwise capitalist-minded drama, but the role feels just a touch underwritten.  Her shining moment comes at the end of the film when she calls out to Sonny to review her amended terms should her son sign with Nike, and it is not the fault of the actor, but having her sitting alone in the kitchen for one of the most impactful scenes of the film is a bold move and it simply does not pay off.  The connection with her cast is lost, and while the performance is not weak, like so much else in the film, it was poorly executed at a directorial level and could have also been corrected had there been a little more care taken on the page. 

Air, despite its shortcomings, is still a very competently made film, though rather forgettable. It seems unsure of what story it wants to tell – Nike is already an established company, the Jackson family are all in supporting roles, the actual creation of the shoe is little more than a brief montage – and audiences are left similarly confused. It hardly even serves as a commercial for Nike or the Air Jordan because the product is featured so sparingly, and while the last thing we need is more blatant, feature-length commercials polluting cinema screens, it would at least give the film some sense of purpose. Affleck’s direction seems hesitant, possibly licking his wounds after Live by Night (2016), but in doing so the film is devoid of style, energy, or any real hook outside of reading through the cast list. Damon is showing up for his friend and putting in a day’s work, but largely seems to be on autopilot as the role does not require any real heavy lifting from the actor, nor does it really allow him the space to build beyond what is on the page. Air is not a bad film, but given the pedigree of those involved, it certainly should have been better.