King Richard review — a towering turn from Will Smith as Venus and Serena’s father

★★★★☆
A towering turn from Will Smith, his best since Ali and one of the year’s great screen performances, defines nearly every frame of this film. He plays Richard Williams, the father of the tennis champions Venus and Serena Williams, in a movie that is authorised by the Williams family, carefully charts their seismic impact on the sporting world and credits Venus and Serena with key executive producer roles.

In short, the potential for preening self-aggrandisement is seemingly hardwired into the project. And indeed there are tiny traces of the panegyric it might have been in the characterisations of the young Venus (Saniyya Sidney) and Serena (Demi Singleton), who are often tentatively drawn and frequently reduced to biddable, smiley, saintly vessels of tennis-playing purity.

Smith’s