Race (2016)

What makes it different from others?

This Movie Can Only Be Described With One Word.

Disturbing yet enthralling

One of the most extraordinary films you will see this year. Take that as you want.

Race, a film about the legendary Olympian Jesse Owens, is a story that deserves a good biopic. Owens means more to me for what his achievement meant to politics than as an athlete; "Race" is an obviously perfect title for concisely referring to both. The film itself is competently done in many of its technical aspects, although the way the names of places are paraded on screen when the story switches settings is tacky, at best. James gives a good performance; much of the film's handling of his story is well done.The problem is that the film attempts to include too much. There's not much reason why this needed to go above the two-hour mark. We see a lot of scenes where Owens isn't present, and many of these don't need to be here. He don't need a story about the general history of Nazi Germany; we don't need to see the conflicts between Goebbels and his film director; we don't even need to see as much as what we saw about the debate as to whether the US should boycott the Olympics. Immaterial, and trimming can heighten impact. I was half- expecting we'd get a scene depicting Hitler committing suicide in his bunker. Still, on the whole, Race, as a story about Owens, makes a nice statement.

Firstly there are a lot of good things about this movie. First, it is a story that needed to be told. Jessie Owens was one of the greatest athletes of all time, yet because he was black his achievements did not give him the rewards it should have. Had he been white he would have been set for life. Sadly this shows what a racist country America is, despite their dictating to other countries such as Nazi Germany and South Africa, America has always practised extreme racism and segregation, especially in the South. The fact that the President did not have Jessie in the White house but entertained the other athletes speaks volumes. Although this is hinted at in the movie, especially near the end when Jessie and his wife have to use the trade entrance to a hotel where they were holding an event in HIS honour, I felt that this could have been shown more in the movie. The racism of red neck type footballers in university was not enough. The other thing that irritated me was the way Jessie's white coach was featured as being almost responsible for how good Jessie was. How true there relationship was is not clear, but him making sure Jessie did not have to work to pay for his college fees was made up. Stephan James does a good job in the title role but looks very little like the real man. Shanice Banton as his understanding wife was very good and stole every scene she was in.So over all a good movie, still worth watching that could have been more hard hitting and accurate.

"Race" is a nice biographical pic about the track and field athlete Jesse Owens. You'll enjoy this film for the drama and suspense that is displayed in it. This film is a well put together piece of work that keeps the memory of Jesse Owens alive with good acting coming from Stephan James, who played Jesse Owens, and Jason Sudeikis, who played Larry Snyder, Jesse Owens' coach. Speaking of Jason Sudeikis, although he did a good job, I had to get use to seeing him playing a serious role with this film. This film was well written too. It illustrated Jesse Owens' life and how society was towards people of color and other minorities and the hard aces they had to endure in those days especially competing against Adolf Hitler and his Aryan race ideology and proving them wrong. This film is definitely worth the watch. It's a film for everyone and everybody no matter who you are. It will keep you entertained and at the same time informed on some history. I definitely recommend it. You won't be disappointed.

My wife and I watched this at home on DVD from our public library. The movie is very well made, entertaining and historically important.When I was a boy growing up in the 1960s I was a rabid track and field fan and, even though it happened in the 1930s I was aware of Jesse Owens and his great times in the dashes, times that are great even today, 80 years later, that is how good he was. But until I saw this movie I never knew his name was "J.C.", for James Cleveland, not Jesse at all, but that is what one teacher though he was saying and the name stuck.The story here is set between about 1933, when Jesse was almost 20 and going off to college at Ohio State and 1936, the year of his Olympic victories in Germany, much to the distress of Hitler and the Nazi regime. The story overall seems to stick pretty closely to the facts, although many things about Jesse Owens in private time had to be invented.Stephan James was about 20 during filming, he is Jesse Owens. He had to undergo quite a lot of training to look like a sprinter and to mimic the particular running style of Owens. He does very well in the part.Usually just a funnyman, Jason Sudeikis is really good as Larry Snyder, the track coach at Ohio State who fine-tuned Owens' running to help him become the world-beater that he was.The 1936 Olympic games are dramatized well here. Overall a very entertaining and historically significant story, very well presented.