Le Mans (1971)

Nutzer-Bewertung:

6.4/10   

Regisseur:

Lee H. Katzin

Drehbuchautor:

Harry Kleiner (writer)

Premierendatum:

23. Juni 1971 (USA)

Genre:

Action | Abenteuer | Sport

Werbezeile:

Steve McQueen takes you for a drive in the country. The country is France. The drive is at 200 MPH!

Plot:

Almost in breadth and depth of a documentary, this movie depicts an auto race during the 70s on the...

Plot Keywords:

Celebrity | Flag | Contest | Endurance | Applause

Auszeichnungen:

Nominated for Golden Globe.

Nutzerkommentare:

Delaney - the unheroic hero (and all the better for it)

US TV Schedule:

Sun. Oct. 26

6:00 PM

TCM

Besetzung

Steve McQueen	...	Michael Delaney
Siegfried Rauch	...	Erich Stahler
Elga Andersen	...	Lisa Belgetti
Ronald Leigh-Hunt	...	David Townsend
Fred Haltiner	...	Johann Ritter
Luc Merenda	...	Claude Aurac
Christopher Waite	...	Larry Wilson
Louise Edlind	...	Mrs. Anna Ritter
Angelo Infanti	...	Lugo Abratte
Jean-Claude Bercq	...	Paul-Jacques Dion
Michele Scalera	...	Vito Scaliso
Gino Cassani	...	Loretto Fuselli
Alfred Bell	...	Tommy Hopkins
Carlo Cecchi	...	Paolo Scadenza
Richard Rüdiger	...	Bruno Frohm

Länge:

106 Min

Land:

USA

Sprache:

Englisch

Farbe:

Farbe

Seitenverhältnis:

2.20 : 1

Tonverfahren:

70 mm 6-Track (70 mm prints) | Mono (35 mm prints)

Altersfreigabe:

West Germany:12 (f) | New Zealand:G | Australia:G | Finland:K-8 | Singapore:PG | Sweden:11 | USA:G

Drehorte:

Le Mans, Sarthe, France

Firma:

Cinema Center Films

Dies und das:

John Sturges was originally hired to direct, but left the project due to Steve McQueen interfering in almost everything. He was replaced by Lee H. Katzin.

Pannen:

Abfolgefehler: The main accident scene has at least four cars involved, but only the important two are mentioned by the track announcer.

Dialogzitate:

Lisa Belgetti: When people risk their lives, shouldn't it be for something very important?
Michael Delaney: Well, it better be.
Lisa Belgetti: But what is so important about driving faster than anyone else?
Michael Delaney: Lotta people go through life doing things badly. Racing's important to men who do it well. When you're racing, it's life. Anything that happens before or after is just waiting.

Querbezüge:

Bezug enthalten in Viktor Vogel - Commercial Man (2001)

Delaney - the unheroic hero (and all the better for it)

It's always the dispassionate films executed in documentary style that show us what mankind is truly capable of and consequently make us passionate. Kubrick did as much regarding space travel in 2001: A Space Odyssey, as did Wise in his portrayal of scientific method in The Andromeda Strain. When Delaney (McQueen) undramatically explains his motivation for returning to the most demanding of the GT endurance races with the plainly delivered words "When you're racing - it's life. Anything that comes before or after is just waiting" we realise that any emotional content delivered on top of the actions of such men would be superfluous, or would even detract from their achievements.

To the unfamiliar viewer, raised on the formulaic and dependable sports action drama, the tension is in all the wrong places. The start of the race - effectively a 15 minute build up to the 4 o'clock commencement climaxing in Delaney's racing heartbeat and the roar of 50 or so competition engines - has us more wound up than the sequence portraying the final lap (but only just). Similarly, the scene in which Delaney's team manager (Ronald Leigh-Hunt) orders him back on the circuit after a near-fatal accident is without the (surely obligatory nowadays?) show of defiant reluctance - Delaney is hardly the identikit Hollywood hero whom we could expect to confront authority armed to the teeth with the usual cocky dialogue. Quite the opposite. Delaney - the lop-sided figure quite unable even to cope with a confrontation with a fellow racing-driver's widow without feeling awkward - realises that, rather narrowly, he is able only to drive faster than most other professional drivers and that he has no self-affirming existence outside of the demands and constraints of the team.

For all those who believe that the heroes of this world are those who rebelliously reject such impositions on the 'free-spirited' individual - whether they be the social class-based constraints of Titanic or the intellectual ones of Dead Poets Society - the film will no doubt descend into lap upon lap of fast Ferraris and Porsches (as it did for the Time Out film reviewer). Those of us who know that mankind's most towering achievements (winning an event such as the 24 hours of Le Mans being no exception) have been constructed by relatively stunted men and women will sympathise with the character of Michael Delaney. Delaney is no hero, but is all the more heroic for it.