I did not enjoy "The Bronze", though the premise sounded very promising and the film could have worked. The main character, Hope (Melissa Rauch) was thoroughly despicable--super-crude, nasty, self-absorbed and without redeeming qualities. And, this tended to make the film a very one-note sort of viewing experience...something that wouldn't have happened had the film either been a short or if there was more to the movie than that. As it is, it's a hard movie to like or even enjoy.

Hope is a woman who won a Bronze medal back in 2004. Since then, she's done nothing with her life and she spends her time feeling sorry for herself, stealing, masturbating, doing drugs, treating everyone around her like dirt as well as living as if the world owes her. When her old coach kills herself, Hope is given a chance to do something with her life....to coach a young gymnastic hopeful to glory. However, at first, Hope just wants to destroy her new charge and gets her using drugs, overeating and making a mess of herself. Later, very inexplicably, she kinds of takes her job seriously....and becomes nice, sort of. What's to come of all this? And, more importantly, does anyone even care or does this make any sense?

When I read the reviews for this film, I was very surprised that most seemed reasonably positive and the film has an overall score of 5.9....not good but certainly not terrible. Well, I thought the film was rather terrible...mostly because Hope was so unremittingly awful and unlikable...and this went on and on and on. The woman is ONLY a jerk and her language would make Joe Pesci's character in "Good Fellas" blush. Crudeness and nastiness alone do not make a good comedy--especially after the novelty of it all quickly wears off. And, for me, it wore off very quickly and the film repeatedly comes CLOSE to being funny but almost never does it connect.

By the way, despite my strongly disliking the film and how crude it was, oddly, the funniest moment was the dirtiest--with one of the funniest and most acrobatic sex scenes in film history. I say watch that scene and ignore the rest. Also, if you want to see a similar sort of sports comedy that works, try "Blades of Glory".

I am surprised that the movie flopped and received many bad reviews. In my opinion it was a really good movie.

Melissa Rauch does a great job as the lead character. She is raunchy funny but she is not a one dimensional character and through her depth we see her also as a vulnerable, hurt and lost person.

It is both a comedy and drama. And I like the balance between them. We laugh in between but the main parts of the movie are actually not all that funny and more emotional. I did laugh a lot, but I absolutely enjoyed watching Hope rediscovering her love for life, including the great confrontation scene with her father.

The movie is better than most sports movies. It is not too sweet and written by the common formula. But it includes some good scenes related to the sport like for example the gymnastics sex scene.

The ending also makes one happy. This is what we have been rooting through this movie and it is nice to see it happening.

In some ways, "The Bronze" is so entertaining because Melissa Rauch is playing someone in diametric opposition to her mousy character on "The Big Bang Theory". Hope Gregory is the sort of Olympics washout that's fun to laugh at; a foul-mouthed brat who trades in her local celebrity for free stuff at the mall. Rauch really plays the Midwestern accent to the hilt, and it pairs very nicely with the coarse dialogue.

Somewhere in all of this is a sports movie, but that's not where it excels. This character ends up right back where she started, and it works great as an exaggerated portrait of a has-been in a no-name town. This flew completely under my radar, and I was surprised (happily) by how enjoyable it was.

She's very funny.

7/10