Borg vs. McEnroe (2017): Sweden, Denmark, Finland

Reviewed by Margaux Pfau. Viewed at the Santa Barbara Film Festival.

Directed by Janus Metz, Borg vs. McEnroe looks back on the rivalry between the two legendary tennis players Björn Borg and John McEnroe, who fought against each other to win Wimbledon in 1980.

The movie gets deeper into Borg and McEnroe different personalities. We see Borg as someone who’s really introvert and cold, and McEnroe as to extrovert and not mature. But at the end, they share the same talent and the same goal. Metz really highlights that by showing in his movie that both of them have more in common than what they think.

The rivalry of the movie can be compared to the rivalry shown in the movie Rush (Ron Howard, 2013) between the race drivers Hunt and Lauda in Formula 1 racings. Which made me skeptical about Borg vs. Mc Enroe movie. The reason is that I don’t really have interest in tennis, but I don’t either in Formula 1 racing, and I really liked the movie Rush. So I thought that even if I wasn’t passionate about tennis, the film would still be interesting and telling something I had no idea of. Which is partially true considering that I didn’t even know who were Borg and McEnroe before. But otherwise I have to be honest, I found the movie really long and I wouldn’t recommend it if you’re not really into tennis. Otherwise, I have to conceive that the psychology perspective that Metz brought to the movie was the most positive point. I think that the critics are very lukewarm, tennis lovers will probably love it, while some people like me would just be indifferent but at least if you don’t know anything about Borg and McEnroe, you end up learning something.