Even if you don't know a thing about cycling, you'll probably love Breaking Away because it tells a great tale and has characters anyone can identify with. If you're a cyclist, you'll watch this film again and again.

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Product Description

This charming, Academy Award winner (1979, Screenplay) cycles high on comedy as four friends come to terms with life after high school. When top-notch cyclist Dave (Dennis Christopher) learns that the world's bicycling champions are always Italian, he attempts to turn himself into an Italian, driving his parents (Barbara Barrie, Paul Dooley) crazy. But everything changes after he meets the Italian racing team-an encounter that ultimately leads him and his friends (Dennis Quaid, Daniel Stern, Jackie Earle Haley) to challenge the local college boys in the town's annual bike race.

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Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #5504 in DVD
• Released on: 2002-01-29
• Rating: PG (Parental Guidance Suggested)
• Aspect ratio: 1.33:1
• Formats: Closed-captioned, Color, DVD-Video, Subtitled, Widescreen, NTSC
• Original language: English, French
• Subtitled in: Spanish
• Number of discs: 1
• Running time: 100 minutes

Amazon.com
Peter Yates's flag-waving film stands with To Kill a Mockingbird and American Graffiti as one of the best films about small-town Americana. Steve Tesich won an Oscar for his semi-biographical screenplay about four 19-year-olds who don't know what to do after high school. Dave Stohler (Dennis Christopher) and his three friends--ex-football star Mike (Dennis Quaid), wily comedian Cyril (Daniel Stern), and tough kid Moocher (Jackie Earle Haley)--are doomed to live in the college town of Bloomington, Indiana, where the local kids (nicknamed "Cutters"--a derogatory reference to quarry workers and their blue-collar families) are looked down on by the uppity students of nearby Indiana University.

Stohler escapes into a world of Italian bicycling, picking up the lingo, the accent, and a good share of the talent of his heroes. He is also the scourge of his father's life. The used-car salesman (Paul Dooley) doesn't understand his son's affection for bicycling or, for that matter, his pride in being a "Cutter."

Breaking Away rehabilitates the word heartwarming as Tesich's uncommonly intelligent script gives us well-rounded characters and a potent sense of place. The grandstanding finale--the real life "Little 500" bike race--gives the film a perfect, crowd-pleasing end. However, the film never sacrifices the development of characters for the action. Dooley is especially effective in one of those once-in-a-lifetime roles. The lifelong character actor's place in film history is established with this indispensable performance. --Doug Thomas

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Customer Reviews

THE ITALIANS ARE COMING!
Two words: Dennis Quaid. He's so hot right now! This movie is a classic and anyone who hasn't seen it is a cinematic idiot.

Back home in Indiana
Having attended IU my Freshman year ('69/'70), I can attest that Breaking Away was certaingly not filmed on a Hollywood sound stage, but entirely in Bloomington, Indiana as the film's end credits proclaim. It is a delightful movie the whole family can enjoy. It is a relatively short movie with many funny moments (Paul Dooley is fantastic) and for me, reminiscent of my days at IU (the warm waters of the abandoned stone quarries, the beautiful IU library and the Little 500 race to name a few).
Wonderful characters make the story extremely enjoyable. It's one of my favorite movies. ...LAP

A great American movie set in a real, mythological American place
One of my favorite movies - so different from 99% of Hollywood movies that I am ashamed that my country produces and supports.

This movie is set in a specific place - Bloomington Indiana and the movie does an excellent job of taking us in to the real culture of real people - real Americans and we like these people, we relate to their fears and their dreams.

The hero Dave Stoehler is a romantic dreamer, but his dreams are just an extension of himself and his family. He is stretching things a bit to present himself as a great Italian bicycle racer from a proud, large Italian family. But the reality is that he is great Bicycle racer and his family is a great proud American family, who play Italian opera love songs and it really isn't an act. These are great people and if the cheating, Italian professional bicycle team visiting Bloomington IN didn't see it, everyone else eventually does see it.

The used car salesman father, ex-cutter character is fantastic. And the town of Bloomington IN comes off as a great place - even if there are some mean, spoiled rich IU students there , and even they eventually see some light.

God bless all those who worked to create this gem.

God bless America.

Let's hope we get a few more of these types of movies, maybe once every 20 years.