Race
Short description
Race is a historical drama about Jesse Owens, the American track and field athlete whose success carried him to the 1936 Olympic Games in Berlin. Raised in difficult circumstances in Ohio, Owens trains under coach Larry Snyder at Ohio State, and his performances earn him a place on the American team. The Games, staged by the Nazi regime as a showcase for its ideology of racial superiority, become the setting where Owens competes before Adolf Hitler and a watching world. The film follows his preparation and the pressure surrounding his decision to take part at all.
Stephen Hopkins directs from a screenplay by Anna Waterhouse and Joe Shrapnel. The film sits late in a directing career that began with A Nightmare on Elm Street: The Dream Child in 1989 and includes Predator 2, The Ghost and the Darkness, Lost in Space and The Life and Death of Peter Sellers.
Stephan James plays Owens, with Jason Sudeikis as Snyder, Shanice Banton as Ruth Solomon, Eli Goree as Dave Albritton, Carice van Houten as Leni Riefenstahl and Jeremy Irons as Avery Brundage. Made on a budget of about 25 million USD, it took a similar amount worldwide. On IMDb it holds 7.1/10 from 44,000 votes, and on TMDB 7.3/10 from 1,647 votes, while the critics' rating stands at 6.1/10 from 158 reviews.
What's left behind the scenes
- Filming began on July 24, 2014, in Montreal and at the Olympic Stadium in Berlin.
- Snyder, played by Jason Sudeikis, buys Owens a new pair of shoes from Adolf “Adi” Dassler, who would later found the Adidas company.
- The liner carrying the US team to Berlin is called the "Manhattan." Launched in 1931, it made regular transatlantic voyages until 1941, when the ship was renamed "Wakefield" and converted into a World War II transport vessel. "Wakefield" was assigned to the US Coast Guard, where it became the largest ship in the fleet. After the war, the ship remained in reserve and was scrapped in 1964.
- The daughters of Jesse Owens provided invaluable assistance in the making of the film. The filmmakers sent them the script for review, and then the screenwriters traveled to France to meet with them in person. The daughters called the script "heartfelt." They visited the set repeatedly, providing Stephan James with detailed accounts of what their father was like.
- Almost no confirmed information remains about Larry Snyder. While working on his image, Jason Sudeikis drew inspiration from Gene Hackman's performance in David Anspaugh's "Hoosiers" (1986) and Kevin Costner's in Ron Shelton's "Bull Durham" (1988).
- Jason Sudeikis’ first dramatic role in his career.
- Jesse Owens won 4 gold medals at the 1936 Summer Olympics in Berlin. The film was released on the 80th anniversary of the Berlin Olympics.
- The film depicts a conversation between Jesse Owens and Luz Long. Long even helps his competitor with a long jump. According to an interview Owens gave to historian Tom Ecker, author of "Olympics: Facts and Fables," in 1965, nothing like this happened in Berlin, and he did not speak with Long. Nevertheless, Owens and Long did become friends towards the end of the Olympic Games and remained in contact until Long's death in Sicily in 1943. Owens always spoke of Long with undisguised respect.
- Initially, Jesse Owens (1913-1980) was to be played by John Boyega, but the actor chose to film in J.J. Abrams' space opera "Star Wars: The Force Awakens" (2015).
- While athletes listen to a radio broadcast of boxer Joe Louis's (1914-1981) fight, one of them drinks Erin Brew. This was a brand of beer produced by The Standard Brewing Co, a brewery in Cleveland, Ohio, that existed from 1904 to 1961.
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