Blog

43. Chariots of Fire - Bravest Victory

“It was not the prettiest quarter I’ve ever seen Mr. Liddel. Certainly the bravest.”

Hugh Hudson’s 1981 Cinderella story is chock full of running sequences, so how can one stand out? First of all, Hudson is wise enough to make each sequence distinctive either by location or shooting style. Secondly, this one seems like it couldn’t possibly have happened, but it did.

In the film, on June 2nd, 1923, at a 400 meter duel between Scotland and France, Scottish runner Eric Liddel (Ian Charleson) is pushed off the track, falls, rolls, gets back up and comes from last place to win the race. This is apparently based on a true incident, which was actually preceded by Liddel winning two other races that day (if Wikipedia is to be trusted).

The scene also stands out for being a dramatic crossroads for the major players. It’s the first time runner Harold Abrams (Ben Cross) sees his rival Liddel in action. One of the most memorable shots in the sequence takes place not on the track, but in the stands, with Abrams crushing his program as he sees how much of a bad-ass he’s up against.

The scene also introduces trainer Sam Mussabini (Ian Holm). Abrams introduces himself to Mussabini at the end of the sequence (and were introduced, in fact, by Liddel in real life).

Vangelis’ briliantly anachronistic score does a lot of the heavy lifting, as does fantastic camera work by David Watkin, including one amazing shot from behind and overhead as Liddel takes the lead in slo-mo.

As with many successful action sequences, the actors received exhaustive training in their characters’ milieu, so that pain you see on Charleson’s face is real. And the bit where he throws his head back is based on Liddel’s actual habit of throwing his head back to get that last burst of speed.

See also: The rest of Chariots, final race in Breaking Away, Roy’s final at-bat in The Natural

Next: Even without checking, I’m pretty sure this’ll be the only one on the list with a feral kid.