Filmmaker Bryan Fogel set out to make a gonzo documentary about dopingand ended up unearthing the largest, most unbelievable sports scandal in recent memory. The entire saga is captured in Icarus, a Sundance darling that made waves this January when Netflix acquired it for $5 millionone of the highest sums a doc has ever fetched at the festival. <\/p>\n
The story begins with Fogel, a cyclist as well as a documentarian, investigating the effects of performance-enhancing drugs by injecting himself with those very substances. His goal is to prove how simple it is for even an amateur like him to evade anti-doping tests. For assistance, he reaches out to Dr. Grigory Rodchenkov, the Russian doctor in charge of drug testing at Moscows Olympics lab . . . and, as Fogel soon finds out, the mastermind behind the state-approved doping program that boosted his nations performance at the 2014 Sochi Olympics and beyond; as the film reveals, up to 99 percent of Russian athletes are guilty of doping. <\/p>\n
As Fogel and Rodchenkov become more closely entwined, more and more details about the Russian doping program emerge, even as Russia denies that its Sochi medals were ill-gottenand the doctor gradually begins to realize that his insider knowledge has put a target on his back. Things come to a head in the pivotal scene youll find above, exclusively on Vanity Fair, in which Rodchenkov compares himself to Edward Snowden. <\/p>\n
Icarus premieres on Netflix August 4. <\/p>\n
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From Getty Images. <\/p>\n
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2016 Getty Images <\/p>\n
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