As a wrestler, Chris Nowinski played a smug, know-it-all heel. After his career in the ring was cut short by a blow to the head, he discovered just how little anyone knows about chronic traumatic encephalopathy, the debilitating degenerative disease caused by repeated brain injuries. Based on Nowinski’s controversial book on the dangers of contact sports, this documentary from Hoop Dreams director Steve James combines horror stories from retired football, hockey, and soccer players in order to reveal just how widespread
these injuries are. The results are, cinematically speaking, a little diffuse, but any parent who’s contemplating whether they should sign their kids up for Pop Warner this fall may want to watch this first.
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