Most critics come down in favour, and they agree on why: the film gets better once it stops being about Fogel’s own doping experiment and becomes about Grigory Rodchenkov. The praise clusters on Rodchenkov’s testimony, on the access Fogel has to him, and on the way the account of Russia’s state-sponsored doping programme arrives with the pace of a thriller. Several reviewers admit they were unsure of the film for its first stretch and were won over in the second.
The reservations are about shape. Critics call the structure uneven, padded or scattershot, and more than one thinks Fogel keeps himself on camera longer than the story needs. The Guardian also wants more distance from its subject. The spread is narrow, with most scores in the seventies; the one firm dissent comes from Slant Magazine, which finds the film heavy-handed and unfocused and says the filmmaker’s self-involvement never goes away.