For all its discussion of weighty topics such as morality, espionage, and whistleblowing, Bryan Fogel’s Oscar-winning documentary “Icarus” was, at its heart, a buddy comedy. Existential and, at times, terrifying? Sure. But, the oddball relationship between Fogel and Dr. Grigory Rodchenkov — the head of Russia’s anti-doping agency and also the man behind Russia’s vast doping conspiracy — drove the first film all the way to the Academy podium in 2017.
That film also ended on an ellipsis. Sure, Rodchenkov had self-exiled in the US after leaking a trove of documents to the New York Times and forced the IOC (International Olympic Committee) and WADA (World Anti-Doping Agency) to reflect on their own practices, essentially showing the world how much and how often Russia had cheated. But, if you’ve managed to catch the Pyeongchang, Tokyo, or Beijing Olympics, you already know that Russia suffered minor repercussions if any. Just look at Kamila Valieva, a 15-year-old figure skater who was the talk of the Beijing Winter Olympics who tested positive for banned substances and has, just as quickly, been forgotten.
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Fogel’s follow-up, “Icarus: The Aftermath,” touches on Valieva, Russia’s quote-unquote reforms, and more in an ambitious but sometimes unwieldy sequel. More than anything, though, I’m happy to say that “The Aftermath” returns to that strange friendship, even if it takes close to a third of its runtime to reunite Fogel and Rodchenkov. Instead of the first film’s shaggy structure — if you’ll remember, “Icarus” started as a low-stakes ‘man performs experiments on himself’ film before improbably stumbling into a massive conspiracy — “The Aftermath” is a taut thriller that demonstrates how much Fogel has evolved as a political documentarian in the intervening years.
We begin with Rodchenkov, the burly Russian scientist who has essentially gone underground in 2017. Jovial, literate, and well-aware of the implications of his choice to become a whistleblower, “The Aftermath” spends most of the film with him. At the behest of a security team, he is moved around the US constantly, with only an embedded videographer to keep him company, documenting the isolation and boredom that comes with such an earth-shattering decision. All the while, Russian state-sponsored television brands him a traitor, a drug addict, and, as Putin says at multiple points, someone who shouldn’t be alive.
Considering the escalations that Russia has pursued on almost every foreign front, it’s not exactly surprising that Rodchenkov both fears for his life and also wants to refute the character assassination that is being pushed by the Russian media. He finally decides that to do so would require his diaries, which are hidden within Russia. So begins an extended section that, as Grigory describes it, resembles James Bond more than anything.
From there, Fogel moves in a number of different directions, tracking Rodchenkov’s early life as a runner, his current asylum application, WADA’s investigation into Russia, newly installed RUSADA (Russian Anti-Doping Agency) chief Yuri Ganus’s futile attempts at reform, and the IOC’s indifference. What’s more surprising is that “The Aftermath” not only manages to juggle all of these threads, for the most part, and also creates a distinct and clear line that correlates Grigory’s former role in RUSADA to the larger method that Russia had pretty successfully used to dominate the Olympics since the ‘80s.
While there’s much to be said for the ways that Fogel corrals all of this information into a neat and honestly thrilling package, it’s really the quieter moments between him and Grigory that make the most impact. A scene in which the two drink Angry Orchards together after two years without contact, all while Fogel’s Oscar stands at-attention between them on the table, is funny and heartbreaking in a way that perhaps only makes sense for two people who have forged such an unexpected bond.
Just as the film began, it ends with Grigory wondering if what he did was worth the personal hardships that he now has to endure — the frequent conversations with his wife, who he hasn’t seen since escaping Russia are, honestly, devastating. Fogel may have stumbled into one of the biggest sports stories in history, but he also has shown himself to be an adept filmmaker who is able to juxtapose the personal struggles of an individual against larger governmental forces. “The Aftermath” may lack the novelty of the first film and often takes on more than its runtime can account for, but it also successfully adapts the genre of espionage thriller to the documentary form with riveting results. [A-]
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