I have asked certain users on Spout to recommend a movie to me. I will be blogging about these films as I watch them. This film was recommended to me by Tenenbaums.
Breaking Away
Tenenbaums has been a pretty active blogger on this site as well, so I was glad to get a recommendation from him.
Breaking Away was not a film I had not really heard of before. Maybe I briefly noticed it once amongst a filmography list of director Peter Yates, but I did not realize at all that it featured Dennis Quaid and Daniel Stern in such young roles. Honestly, I didn't recognize either of the actors when they first showed up on screen. Stern looks like the perfect dork. I like that they cast such goofy looking kids instead of just trying to find the attractive ones (well apart from Quaid). Jackie Earle Haley is one of the strangest looking guys around. Check him out as an adult as a brilliant piece of casting in Watchmen.
Unfortunately I found the dialogue really horrible, and the plot and pacing quite boring. The main character Dave's constant put on Italian dialect was not endearing to me. In fact it was quite grating. And Paul Dooley as his antagonistic dad was just as horrible to listen to. It was so boring and frustrating to hear them read this script as they went at it.
The actual climax with the final bike race is the best part and has some wonderful moments. I can see why people would rank it up there as one of the greatest sports movie moments. But everything leading up to it was so long and boring that it wasn't enough for me to say I liked the movie.
I do appreciate the recommendation though!
Rating: 5/10