HBO revealed the official trailer for ‘Quad Gods’, a documentary following the world’s first all-quadriplegic e-sports team as they navigate New York City, confront ableism, and pursue their dreams to compete as athletes.
Release Date
Directed by Jess Jacklin, ‘Quad Gods’ originally premiered at this year’s Tribeca Festival. The documentary will premiere on HBO Wednesday, July 10 (9:00 p.m. ET/PT) and will be available to stream on Max.
Synopsis
Quad Gods is a high-stakes and heart-warming film that follows the lives of three New Yorkers with quadriplegia that meet in a neuro-rehabilitation lab where they create the world’s first-ever, fully quadriplegic e-sports team. As they navigate New York City, confronting challenges at every turn, they pursue their shared dream to compete as athletes while subverting assumptions about disability.
Richard, aka “Breadwinner1007,” Blake, aka “RepNProof,” and Prentice, aka “Mongo Slade,” meet at the Abilities Research Center at Mount Sinai Hospital where Dr. David Putrino, known colloquially as the “Quadfather,” develops innovative solutions for rehabilitation and therapy. Illustrating the promise of new technology, including exoskeleton robotics, adaptive controllers, and brain stimulation techniques, Dr. Putrino uses video game playing to aid recovery, not just by being a fun and supportive outlet, but by teaching the brain to rewire and repair itself. Quad Gods follows the e-sports players as they compete in the billion-dollar video gaming world while bringing awareness to the potential of the human mind and spirit. The intimate vérité footage captures the men living life in the city as they work, train, foster relationships, and raise children, and is interwoven with striking animation by Tim Fox conveying their hopes and dreams. Quad Gods is a story of resilience, fortitude, and the power of competition and sportsmanship to restore purpose and community.
Reviews
Daniel Fienberg via The Hollywood Reporter praised the film in his review stating, “Jacklin and cinematographers Alex Takats and David Waldron let the men steer the visual style of what is a very polished documentary. If you come into Quad Gods with the physical limitations of quadriplegics on your mind, what you’ll actually discover is a documentary defined by movement.”
David Ehlich of Indiewire gave the film a B score, writing, “This isn’t an underdog story about defying the odds within the Esports community… On the contrary, this is a glancing but affectingly intimate study about four people who prove to themselves — and to each other — that their brains can be every bit as malleable as their bodies, so long as they’re able to remap the controls.”
Official Trailer
Watch the official trailer for ‘Quad Gods’.