With the Winter Olympics soon upon us, it feels appropriate to bring this one up. The remarkable thing is, few people in Hollywood had any interest in it until the late Dawn Steele picked it up. Luckily she'd been good friends with Michael Eisner from their days as Paramount executives. And from what I've been able to ascertain, the final story's very close to what actually happened (true, they actually were able to get corporate sponsorship and had more time than shown to practice, but I consider those minor points). And over the years the real Jamaicans have been getting better, as they beat both us and the Russian at Lillehammer.
Back to the picture, it flows quite nicely, and the typical sports film cliches that do show up (and there are a little less than usual) don't feel as forced, perhaps since bobsledding is apparently less connected to usual sports. The show stealing performance comes from Doug E. Doug (???) as Sanka Coffee (also ?????); he's got that playfulness that comes shining through.
And then of course there's John Candy in his last masterpiece role. In many ways "Irv" was a reflection of how he felt at that time, having been stabbed in the back by his agents and just about every executive in Hollywood (and the ultimate betrayal would be just around the corner once Bruce McNall, who he though was a friend, would snatch the Toronto Argonauts out from under him). You get the idea that whenever he blows his stack at someone in a scene here, he's venting at an entertainment culture that sold him blind. But the man with the big heart we came to love over the years still manages to shine through the cynicism, and his final soliloquy about never being enough with a gold medal if you're not enough without it is one the world could take to heart, especially on the athletic field.
What do you think of this feature?
Posted by rocksteadyflamethrower (Member # 1065) on :
I enjoyed this movie. I thought that Candy gave a great performance and I liked the reggae version of Talking Heads' "Wild Wild Life" that played in the movie.
I actually recorded this quite a few years ago...I taped over it though. I had to record something for my Mom.
