"You can run. And boy, can you jump. What I want to know is - can you win?"
"In those ten seconds, there's no black or white, only fast or slow.."
— Jesse Owens
Race is a 2016 Biopic film about African-American athlete Jesse Owens, who won a record-breaking four Gold Medals at the Berlin Olympic Games in 1936, defying the racism of both 1930s America and Nazi Germany. The film was directed by Stephen Hopkins, who previously won an Emmy for The Life and Death of Peter Sellers.
Canadian actor Stephan James plays Owens, with Jason Sudeikis as his coach Larry Snyder, William Hurt and Jeremy Irons as Olympic committee officials Avery Brundage and Jeremiah Mahoney, and Carice Van Houten as Leni Riefenstahl, a German propaganda filmmaker making a documentary about the Games.
This film contains examples of:
- 10-Minute Retirement: Jesse, when he stops training to provide for his family, and later when he considers boycotting the Olympics.
- Artistic Licence – History:
- The film follows Leni Riefenstahl's claims that she had a bitter rivalry with Joseph Goebbels, and that she was an unwitting propagandist forced to make films in the Nazis' image. In reality, these assertions (which were made by her after the war) were just an attempt by Leni to rehabilitate her image. There is plenty of evidence that Riefenstahl worked closely with the Nazis on the planning of her films and was highly enthusiastic about Hitler. There is some disagreement about how much any rivalry with Goebbels was ideological versus personal, assuming it even existed in the first place. Some authors, going from Goebbels' diaries which record numerous friendly encounters with Riefenstahl, claim she outright made it up. Basically, the portrayal of Riefenstahl in the film is not at all in accordance with the historical evidence.
- At one point, Snyder witnesses a group of SA brownshirts rounding up Jews into a truck, foreshadowing The Holocaust. Such activities wouldn't be enacted until after the Kristallnacht two years later, and the Nazi regime actually tried to hide their antisemitism during the Olympics by removing anti-Jewish signs from public display and restraining from anti-Jewish activities. Furthermore, the Holocaust was placed under the purview of the SS, not the SA.
- The film buys into the old myth that Adolf Hitler refused to shake Jesse Owens's hand after he beat German runners. In fact,
Hitler didn't personally congratulate any winners after the first day of the competition: he had congratulated all the Germans and a few Finns, only to be told by the IOC that he could either congratulate all the gold medalists, or none at all. Jesse Owens himself said that Hitler had in fact waved to him after he won, and was more insulted at being snubbed by President Franklin D. Roosevelt. Otherwise, Germany had colonies in East Africa before World War I and retained a small minority of African immigrants; the NSDAP's attitude to them was mixed (they weren't "high priority" so to speak to them compared to getting rid of the Jews).
- All Germans Are Nazis: Averted. Jesse's Friendly Rival Luz Long privately expresses skepticism toward the regime, and goes out of his way to congratulate him and walk arm-in-arm with him in solidarity after Owens beats him at the long jump.
- Based on a True Story
- Biopic: About Jesse Owens.
- Bittersweet Ending: Jesse repairs his relationship with Ruth and wins four Olympic medals while striking a blow against white supremacist notions. However, President Roosevelt refuses to meet and congratulate him for racist reasons and the Waldorf Astoria's manager refuses to break societal norms let a black man use the front door to enter a party even though he's the guest of honor (although the white elevator boy at the back entrance does show Jesse some hero worship). Adding to the bittersweetness, attempts to boycott the Olympics in defiance of Hitler and to let Jewish sprinters race against the Aryans fail, and Jesse's Friendly Rival Luz dies in World War II.
- Career-Ending Injury: Eulace Peacock, the only other African-American runner with a chance at qualifying for the Olympics, throws a hamstring and can no longer be a sprinter.
- Double-Meaning Title
- Film Within a Film: Leni Riefenstahl's documentary about the Games, completed and released in 1938 as Olympia.
- Historical Domain Character: A whole cast of them.
- Larry Snyder is an interesting subversion. He very much existed, but little is known about his life or personality, so Jason Sudeikis modelled his performance on Gene Hackman in Hoosiers.
- Hollywood History: It's an oft-repeated myth, which is repeated in this film, that Hitler snubbed Jesse Owens after his victory. He didn't, but he certainly wasn't happy about it and the Nazis did protest. Der Stürmer, the Nazi propaganda newspaper, ran an article by Joseph Goebbels that called for banning "üntermenschen" (subhumans) from the Olympic games. He called Americans "cheaters" for using "subhuman species, more adapted to life in the jungle," to compete, putting "evolved humans" at a disadvantage.
- Sub-Par Supremacist: Naturally, in a sports drama about Jesse Owens, the black athlete who won four gold medals at the Olympic Games hosted by Nazi Germany. After he gets first place in one event, he isn't congratulated by Hitler for obvious reasons.
- Oscar Bait
- Warts and All: Owens cheating on his wife (whom he has a daughter with) for a period of time is shown, even though the film primarily focuses on his triumphs as a barrier-breaking African-American olympian.
