@SteveShaum’s post about the ultrarunning flick coming out soon got me thinking about my favorite running movies. Here are a couple to start. This first one is obvious, but what other running movies would you recommend?
Chariots of Fire: Probably the most iconic running movie of all time. The only real problem, from my perspective, is that it’s largely about sprinters.
McFarland, USA: Fairly recent movie based on the true story of a 1987 mostly Latino cross country team in California. It’s a pretty good depiction of what cross country is like, although they apparently don’t have mud in California. The main anachronism is the coach getting fired for throwing a cleat that hits one of his football players. In the 1980s, that would never have been an issue.
Goshen is one of my favorites. It’s a documentary from 2015 about the Tarahumara—a race of natives in a remote region of Mexico who, for centuries, have embedded running into their culture. (The Tarahumara were also a major part of the book Born to Run.) The film seems to capture their lifestyle very well, and discusses their distance running lifestyle and how they largely avoid modern day diseases while eschewing western medicine.
Forest Gump totally counts. Without it we wouldn’t have all those clever idiots yelling “Run, Forest, run!” from their car windows while we’re on training runs.
@tonya-engst and @meganthom and I saw Brittany Runs a Marathon a while back. It’s not a classic, I don’t think, but it does offer a more modern look at how someone who’s having some trouble with life might find running a source of control and growth.
(2) If you are going to go with one of the Pre biopics, I much prefer “Without Limits” to “Prefontaine.” Give me Billy Crudup as Pre and Donald Sutherland as Bowerman any day of the week over Leto and Ermey. (Sorry, @KeiferD!)
(3) In the ultra category, a couple of my favorites are:
“Unbreakable,” which documents the battle between Geoff Roes and Anton Krupicka almost a decade ago. In my opinion, that race kicked off the ultra boom in the United States.
My favorite running film of all, though, may be this short film from Salomon about Bernd Heinrich. Heinrich’s “Why We Run: A Natural History” is a must read for runners.
Strong agreement on Chariots of Fire as the most iconic running movie of all time. The original film footage of the races from 1924 that you can watch on youtube is remarkably similar to how it is depicted in the film: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZvLl64HI_5M.
