16 Inspiring Movies About the Olympics

Personal Best (1982)

Written and directed by Robert Towne, the screenwriter behind some of the greatest movies of the 1970s (Chinatown, The Last Detail, Shampoo), Personal Best stars Mariel Hemingway, 62, and Patrice Donnelly, 74, as two female track-and-field hopefuls who fall in love while training for the 1980 Moscow Olympics. All of their pain and preparation end in disappointment when the U.S. boycotts the Games, but Towne proves that the spiritual journey (the training, the passion, the sacrifice) is more important than the destination.

Where to watch: Prime Video, Google Play

Tokyo Olympiad (1965)

For my money, this is the best film ever made about the Olympics. Kon Ichikawa’s stunning 2½-hour documentary captures the poetry, the pageantry and the personalities of the 1964 Tokyo Summer Games. What makes the movie so moving is how it focuses as much on the losers as the winners — and in some cases how losing can be its own form of victory. A highlight: Ethiopian marathoner Abebe Bikila entering the stadium to the roars of 75,000 spectators for the final lap of his gold medal performance — a race he won by more than four minutes.

Where to watch: Google Play, YouTube

Downhill Racer (1969)

Robert Redford, 87, at the very peak of his blond-Adonis good looks, gives one his subtlest and most interior performances as a hotshot American skier named David Chappellet who refuses to listen to his teammates and his coach (a wonderfully gruff Gene Hackman, 94). For him, skiing isn’t a team sport, and he isn’t a team player — he’s a loner with a chip on his shoulder and an icy determination to be the best. Only a star of Redford’s caliber could make you root for a character this selfish. Michael Ritchie directs the film with an almost-documentary realism that makes you feel the dangerous velocity of the sport in your frozen bones.

Where to Watch: Prime Video, YouTube

Without Limits (1998)

In the late ’90s, Hollywood actually cranked out two biopics within 12 months about the life and tragic early death of Olympic running sensation Steve Prefontaine. Without Limits arrived in theaters second, but it’s better than Prefontaine, thanks to Billy Crudup, 56, and his sensitive, intelligent turn as the distance runner. Donald Sutherland adds a mighty assist as his sympathetic trainer, Bill Bowerman (who later cofounded Nike). Like Personal Best, this is a running film directed by Robert Towne, but it digs deeper and reveals more soul.

Where to watch: Prime Video, YouTube

I, Tonya (2017)

Margot Robbie soars as Olympic figure skating hopeful and tabloid villainess Tonya Harding in this deliciously arch black comedy about class, the media and the amoral extremes some will go to when a gold medal is at stake. Thanks to some jaw-dropping digital effects, the skating scenes are dizzying and seamless, and Robbie’s trailer-park turn evokes some actual sympathy for a woman who may or may not have fallen in with a couple of Keystone Kop losers because her mother (Oscar-winning Allison Janney, 64) never showed her any warmth unless she was on the ice. A gold medal satire.

Where to watch: Prime Video, YouTube

Unbroken (2014)

Technically more a war film than a sports movie, this is the tragic true story of Louis Zamperini, an American runner who competed in the 1936 Olympics and whose B-24 was later shot down over the Pacific during World War II, leaving him adrift on a life raft for 47 days. Directed by Angelina Jolie and starring Jack O’Connell, the movie cuts back and forth between Zamperini’s track career and his harsh treatment at a Japanese prison camp. Unbroken is a stirring testament to resilience, the human spirit and the heart of a champion.

Where to watch: Prime Video, YouTube

Cool Runnings (1993)

Here’s a light, fizzy antidote to some of the seriousness on this list. This fish-out-of-water comedy has a ton of heart, but it will always be known as “the movie about the Jamaican bobsled team.” Oh well, why fight it? John Candy plays a washed-up former bobsledder who finds a last chance at redemption in training a quartet of Jamaican pals (Leon Robinson, Doug E. Doug, Rawle D. Lewis and Malik Yoba) for the 1988 Calgary Winter Olympics. Problem is, these laughingstocks have never seen a bobsled before. Heck, they’ve never even seen snow! This is a giddy trifle that the grandkids will absolutely eat up with grins on their faces.

Where to watch: Prime Video, YouTube

One Day in September (1999)

There have been some powerful films made about the deadly terrorist attack on the Israeli Olympic team at the 1972 Munich Games (1973’s Visions of Eight, 2005’s Munich), but director Kevin Macdonald’s Oscar-winning documentary gets at the heart of the tragic standoff with a haunting sense of you-are-there immediacy. Combining archival footage and contemporary interviews, One Day in September captures the moment when an event designed to bring the world together lost its innocence.

Where to watch: Pluto

Foxcatcher (2014) 

Channing Tatum and Mark Ruffalo, 56, star as Mark and Dave Schultz, two 1988 Olympic-hopeful wrestlers who fell under the spell of eccentric millionaire John du Pont (Steve Carell, 61, grim beneath a putty nose) with tragic consequences. Directed by Bennett Miller (Moneyball), this film loosely based on real events is about the struggles of amateur athletes in nonglory sports, the drive for excellence, blind ambition and how the American dream can curdle in an instant. This is powerful, powerful stuff.

Where to watch: Prime Video, YouTube

Jim Thorpe — All American (1951)

Burt Lancaster and his granite chin take on the role of one the greatest athletes America ever produced, Native American Olympian Jim Thorpe. Helmed by Casablanca director Michael Curtiz, this surprisingly sensitive (if occasionally melodramatic) biopic not only traces Thorpe’s legendary track-and-field triumphs at the 1912 Olympics but also the heartache that came with having his medals stripped when his amateur status was questioned (the medals were returned in 1983, decades after Thorpe’s death). An oldie and a goody.

Where to watch: Prime Video, YouTube

Eddie the Eagle (2016)

Behind Coke-bottle glasses and a simpleton’s grin, Taron Egerton plays Michael Edwards — a real-life British folk hero with a heart the size of Big Ben. Ironically nicknamed “Eddie the Eagle,” Edwards more than makes up what he lacks in athletic skill with his naïve determination to become the first man to represent Great Britain in Olympic ski jumping since 1928. This is one of those holy-fool heartwarmers that miraculously manages to stick the landing thanks to Egerton, as well as Hugh Jackman, 55, who plays an alcoholic snow groomer who becomes a believer and helps the Eagle take flight.

Where to watch: Prime Video, Max