By: Andrew Wing

King Richard is a 2021 American biographical drama film directed by Reinaldo Marcus Green (also directed Monsters and Men and Joe Bell) and written by Zach Baylin, and follows the legendary life of Richard Williams, the father and coach of famed tennis players Venus and Serena Williams, who also serve as executive producers of the film.

The film stars Will Smith (Independence Day, Men in Black) in the title role as Richard Williams, while Aunjanue Ellis (When They See Us, Lovecraft Country) plays their mother Oracene “Brandy” Price, Saniyya Sidney (Hidden Figures, Fences) plays Venus Williams, and Demi Singleton plays Serena Williams. Tony Goldwyn (Ghost, Scandal) and Jon Bernthal (The Walking Dead, Wind River) also star in supporting roles as tennis coaches Paul Cohen and Rick Macci respectively.

King Richard had its world premiere at the 48th Telluride Film Festival on September 2, 2021, and was theatrically released on November 19, 2021, by Warner Bros. Pictures and on the HBO Max streaming service on the same.

THE GOOD

Before we get into this, I just need to inform the readers that I am a huge tennis fan. I played in high school and I follow it pretty regularly. With that said, when I heard there was going to be a major motion picture following the life of tennis stars Venus and Serena Williams’ father Richard Williams, I was ecstatic to say the least. Going in, it was a no-brainer that I was going to enjoy this movie, but it definitely exceeded my expectations 100%. Let’s find out why!

I won’t waste any time, so let’s get right into it. Will Smith just won himself his first Oscar ladies and gentlemen. It’s happening. Will Smith is the star of all movie stars, but this just might be his crowning achievement of his acting career. Will Smith seemed to have a deep appreciation and understanding of the man that is Richard Williams, and it was evident right from the get go that he totally transformed himself for this role. After watching, I really got a sense of who Richard Williams was at his core and why he was fighting for what he was fighting for and also just where his values came from. You see how he views what he is doing as a means of survival and Will Smith just really allows us as viewers to really see every layer of this man. You completely believe who he is and I was totally sold on every single choice Smith made for this character from the voice and the accent, to the way he walks and to the way he interacts with his daughters. I just felt like I was not watching Will Smith, but rather watching Richard Williams and I don’t know if there is a better compliment than that to give an actor, and I look forward to watching him receive the Academy Award for Best Actor for this performance very soon.

The script for this movie comes from Zach Baylin and it was just brilliant. The movie is really a character study of Richard Williams and what kept me watching was just discovering more about this fascinating character. It’s clear that Will Smith himself and also the writer were really interested in Richard Williams as they painted a very multi-layered portrait of him and also gave him some strong choices to make. The movie presents him with all his glory and all his flaws. We see how charming and likeable he can be, but at the same time we grow frustrated with him throughout the movie. By the end of this film, I felt like I knew very well who Richard Williams was and that’s the entire purpose of a character study so they knocked it out of the park there. What’s special about this movie and what made it go beyond being just another biopic was how we were able to completely understand where Richard Williams is coming from and why he is the way he is. They did this without using explicit flashbacks throughout which we’ve seen over and over again with past biopics and that is a huge testament to how this movie was just expertly crafted.

Outside of all the tennis practices and tennis match scenes that I absorbed every second of being the huge tennis fan that I am, I’d have to say my favorite scenes in the movie were the ones focused on the family as a whole. The movie is certainly centered around Richard and his relationship with Venus and Serena, but the scenes where we see the other family members being fleshed out were really important if you ask me. The reason they felt so important and why I enjoyed them so much are completely thanks to the performances of the supporting cast. The best performance from the supporting cast without a doubt comes from Aunjanue Ellis who plays Venus and Serena’s mother, Oracene “Brandy” Price. She was phenomenal in this role and she will most definitely be getting nominated for Best Supporting Actress and she has a damn good chance of winning. If you need any convincing, go watch the scene in this where she absolutely goes off on Richard because it was unquestionably her “Oscar scene” and might have even been the most powerful moment in the entire film.

Demi Singleton was great as a younger Serena Williams, but Saniyya Sidney definitely stole the show as Venus. They gave a lot of moments to her in the second half where we get a little deeper into what she’s going through emotionally and she was just amazing. I also really liked Jon Bernthal in this as he plays the famous tennis coach Rick Macci. He’s very good and he gives a very funny performance which was great to see considering we don’t get to see that side of him too much as he usually plays the badass character in his films who do a lot of beating people up. It’s just crazy to see how far he has come since being Shane in The Walking Dead, and I can’t wait to see what he does next because he is a very talented actor.

Lastly, I did think the film was very well put together and I was very impressed with the direction we got from Reinaldo Marcus Green. The film had a nice warm glow to it and the camera movement was always really smooth which sometimes isn’t the case with movies dealing with fast-paced sports. The editing, sound mixing, and score were also very good and Beyoncé’s original song “Be Alive” that plays over the credits is beautiful and will most likely win the Oscar for Best Original Song as Beyoncé has somehow yet to win as Oscar. All in all, King Richard is a great movie and it will certainly be one of the ten Best Picture nominees and I could really see this winning Best Picture a few months from now.

THE BAD

There have been a lot of films that I’ve reviewed in the past that I didn’t have much to criticize about when it comes to “The Bad” portion of a review. With King Richard though, I honestly have nothing bad to say about it. Sure the film is long with its 145 minute runtime and it also has some of the inspirational and motivational quips we often get with sports movies, but if they get the job done and inspire and motivate you like this film did for me, I am not going to critique that whatsoever.

Also, and this is just my selfish self talking, but if I had to have any nitpicks, I would say that I wanted more scenes of Serena. The main part of the story deals with Venus coming up through the different levels of being a professional tennis player with her being the first to do it with her being the older sister. But I mean Serena is the freaking GOAT of women’s tennis, so it just would have been awesome to get more scenes of her, but hey you never know maybe we will get a sequel (probably not though).

THE VERDICT

With an Oscar-winning performance from the legendary Will Smith, King Richard is one of the best movies of the year. It is one of those feel-good crowd pleasers that don’t come around too often as it tells the amazing story of Richard Williams, the father of tennis superstars Venus and Serena Williams.

The film also features great supporting performances from Aunjanue Ellis and Jon Bernthal that are worthy of supporting actress and actor nominations respectively, but no performance outshines that of Will Smith. His performance is transformative and it will just have you so deeply invested into the character that is Richard Williams.