Breaking Away, Peter Yates (1979)

FILM: Social class, cycling and smokestack Americana in a film whose appeal is undiminished by time

Now 30 years old, Breaking Away is one of the sweetest, most poignant, coming-of-age ficks ever made. With Bicycle Thieves, it is one of the few movies with a cycling content that regularly features in general ‘top tens’ of any kind of film.

Its the story of four, blue-collar 19 year olds in Bloomington, Indiana, a Midwestern town dominated by extractive industry and its university (considered one of the architectural marvels of US higher education). One of the gang, Dave Stoller (Dennis Christopher), has developed an all-consuming obsession with Italy, and particularly Italian cycling.

All are at a loose end after school – not quite sure about going to college, not able to find proper jobs because the local quarries are in decline. Stoller fills his time training on his beautiful postbox-red Masi bike, the rest swim in dramatically-geometric flooded quarries.

Tension between the lads and the relatively privileged university students, who look down at the townies – or ‘cutters’ as they are known – runs through the script. Indeed, the real story of this film is one of cross-generational social mobility and the difficulties this poses for young adults and their families.
It is by no means its only strength, however. The entire cast is good, from a young Dennis Quaid as the wannabe quarterback, to Paul Dooley as Dave Stoller’s frustrated father.

The cycle event that is the film’s climax is also extraordinary. Indiana University’s Little 500 is a real bike race – and to this day is a massive sporting and social event in Bloomington. The film captures it brilliantly, indeed, all the cycling action is masterfully depicted.

Much of the strength scriptwriter Steve Tesich’s screenplay is derived from being so firmly rooted in actual places and events. Tesich studied at Indiana University, took part in the Little 500, and was a member of the team of which one member famously rode 139 of the 200 laps of the race. Bloomington and its environs are very obviously the backdrop for the action.

It has aged very little since 1979. Breaking Away is as delightful, and insightful as ever and contains nothing that grates on modern sensibilities. Were one to set out now to make a film in which the young bucks of 1979 struggled to cope with the challenges and disappointments of middle age, sartorial developments aside, the essential tension would be much as Yates captured it here.

TD July 10

The follow up, American Flyers, is also worth seeking out.