The Jesse Owens biopic Race is warm, even moving betimes, as Owens (Stephan James) a hugely gifted track and field athlete is determined to compete at the highest level, despite the handicap of being a young black man living in 1930s USA. In that period of strict segregation, folks like Jesse travelled at the back of the bus all their lives effectively and had little to hope for in terms of career.
Newly arrived at university in Columbus Ohio, Owens, however, is fortunate to meet the man who will turn his fortunes around, the irascible coach Larry Snyder (Jason Sudeikis). Snyder was himself an athlete who failed to realise his dream of being a top-class athlete.
Snyder builds Owens’ confidence on the track and demands that he commit himself to representing the USA in the 1936 Olympics, to be hosted by Germany in Berlin. However, Jesse has a woman back home who is the mother of their daughter. It’s not so simple, but he is utterly determined to succeed.
The young athlete hugely impresses in succeeding months, particularly in a number of track and field events on one day in Ann Arbor, Michigan. A spanner enters the works when America threatens to boycott the Olympic games - Nazism is on the rise, with reports of cruel treatment of racial minorities, including Jews and Blacks.
Up and Over: Jesse Owens, played by Stephan James
The leader of America's Olympics organisations is the multi-millionaire builder Avery Brundage (Jeremy Irons). Brundage travels to Berlin to talk tough to Goebbels and demand certain standards. Blacks and Jews need not apply, if we are talking the Olympics - unless, of course, the formidable Brundage and Uncle Sam threaten to spoil the party. Official Germany is represented by Goebbels, played Nazi-cliche glacial and unsmiling throughout by one Barnaby Metschurat.
Stephan James (Owens)and Jeremy Irons as the swaggering, duplicitous Avery Brundage
Thus the movie slides expertly into political and diplomatic territory and the question of racial identity in an official Germany already obsessive about Aryanism. Owens dithers about participation in the Games, but in the end he goes, wins the all-important gold medal and sufficient extra to make him the greatest of all American Olympians. He is also filmed by an entranced Leni Riefenstahl in a fascinating portrayal by Carice van Houten.
All in all a conventional movie that won't frighten the horses.
Paddy Kehoe
