Syl Lance Armstrong finally comes clean about his drug use after years of denial to the public. He was an American hero and cycling icon who defeated cancer once. In this candid and honest documentary, Alex Gibney doesn't come with kid gloves to a man who has lied and deceived him and many others. There were other cyclists who paid the price for doping but not Armstrong. When he finally comes clean, he tries again the for the next Tour De France and proves that he can compete without the drugs in his system. But that's too little too late. The damage has been done to his image and others as well. There are times when you're sympathetic to Lance Armstrong and sometimes not. He is complex human being. He still is worth millions of dollars but he's banned from cycling world events. He has become a pariah in the sport that he made famous.

Sergeant_Tibbs I always admire the commitment of a documentarian. It feels destined for Alex Gibney to have been following Lance Armstrong just before the turn of his downfall as all his documentaries need a tinge of controversy before they're just right. A comeback film wouldn't have been as interesting as this. Perhaps it's morbid curiosity of why I'm looking into Lance Armstrong more now that the truth has broken out than when he was heroic cyclist who wasn't held back by a little cancer. What brings a man to do something like this? What was the point? The Armstrong Lie has intimate access to the disgraced icon and it's undeniable that he's compelling to watch, if sometimes repulsive. Above all, it reveals the nature of our celebrity worship culture and the power it feeds and the lives it destroys.The documentary covers all aspects of the sport of cycling. It's quite infectious with its cinematic style and I regret watching this the day that the Tour de France was close to me but I missed it. The film gives scattered information about the basics but there's great insight into how the cheating works. The cutting makes the human drama thrilling as people try to beat Armstrong at his game. The film doesn't necessarily take a side, but he still makes you sick to your stomach when he lies through his teeth to the camera. I couldn't help but keep thinking that Ben Foster will be perfect for Stephen Frears' upcoming film. We still haven't got all the facts, especially about Armstrong's peers, and there's quite a bit about media manipulation here too which the film is a part of, but the story of a contemporary legend falling touches an aching nerve.8/10

dallasryan First and foremost, I don't condone anything Lance Armstrong did. That being said, from a summarized look, we all live lives that are constructed for us. Some are mothers, others are painters, others are this or that. So with someone in high stakes sports at the most difficult and professional level, it's tough to judge anyone unless one's walked a day in their shoes/in their life.It can be understood that Armstrong had everything at stake, everything to lose on this lie, therefore it can be understood why he kept it going. And if any one of us were put in that situation where the stakes were just as high, who knows what we would do. It's easy to judge, but it's not easy to live a life where the stakes are so extreme.With that said, I never caught on to the whole Armstrong Phenomena, but if I was to learn one of my heroes such as Joel O'Steen was a liar, I would be crushed. So I dislike what Armstrong did extremely not for the lie itself or for what he felt he had to do, but for how the lie connected with so many people and how it hurt so many people. For that and that alone I dislike Armstrong very much.Because even though he did have cancer, he used it in connection with his one big lie to inspire hope, love, money, friendships, and infinite possibilities that anything can be beaten or achieved. His foundations raised so much money for a good cause, that it helped many children and adults fight their battles.The money his organization raised did so much good. We should be thankful that the organization saved a lot of lives with the money it raised. But the Armstrong lie shattered a lot of lives with people losing their inspiration and hope, and hating Armstrong. It also wasn't right how Armstrong defamed a lot of people to keep the lie going.It's really about the children though, where Armstrong is in the scenes with the kids with cancer, and with their parents. I can just imagine if those kids were still alive and how those parents must have felt that this man, Lance Armstrong, had the audacity to lead these parents and children on with this lie. Because the hope wasn't so much the cancer, it was that he was beating the odds with it with his cycling. And the cycling was the lie, and everything else was connected to that lie and went down the drain with that lie.Lance Armstrong understood what was at stake and he understood what would happen if he was caught and I respect at least the fact that he was completely honest with his truth about it finally, showing no remorse because showing any emotion would have been in vain anyway. However, it shows what a cold and in some way heartless human being Armstrong is in not breaking down and feeling bad for what he did. It's human to feel bad for living a lie. It's human to feel stress that what you're doing if you are caught hurt yourself and a lot people.But it seems Armstrong showed no remorse at all. He was living the incarnate of a slippery slope, of walking the line, the tightrope, in the end everything went down with his lie because it was all connected to it, from the cancer, to the hope he inspired, to the money, to the everything, that one lie became the lie to everything.At least Armstrong understood the fact that it's fair that he's getting what he deserves now. Maybe he's not ultimately an awful person, but he got caught in a lie that made him an awful person. I almost wish he would have never gotten caught for the good that his Cancer Organization did. Such a shame all around. Truly is. Shame on Lance for how he hurt and destroyed so many people.

l_rawjalaurence THE ARMSTRONG LIE is a fascinating documentary. Shot over a period of four years, it purports to investigate the oft-repeated claim that cyclist Lance Armstrong was a cheat, and that every single one of his Tour de France wins were achieved by taking drugs. Alex Gibney's narrative begins as a defense of Armstrong's behavior, but as different elements of the truth emerge, so the filmmaker has to keep readjusting his position. Gibney is obviously a fan of Armstrong (as many people still are), but as the seamy details of what the cyclist did in order to win his races gradually emerge, so the filmmaker gradually understands how wrong-headed he has been give his unquestioning support. Armstrong emerges as a thoroughly unsavory character, pathologically unwilling to acknowledge the truth about himself, and always looking to manipulate the media so that he emerges in a positive light. Even his so-called 'confessional' interview with Oprah looks like a deliberate attempt to rescue his reputation. As the narrative unfolds, so Gibney gradually comes to understand the truth about his subject, and realizes to his cost that much of the film has unwittingly helped to obfuscate that truth, portraying Armstrong instead as a man more sinned against than sinning. It is only right at the end that Gibney admits the truth of Armstrong's motives, and how Armstrong himself has deliberately duped the filmmaker. As a result THE ARMSTRONG LIE is a film that is more about media manipulation than anything else, revealing just how persuasive - and dangerous - a person Armstrong actually is. There's no guarantee that he might not manage to clear his reputation in the future, despite what he has done.