BREAKING AWAY: GROWING UP IS HARD TO DO

Twilight Time has just released this film to blu-ray and it’s wonderful that they have. I’m finding that there are a number of people out there who have either forgotten this movie or just have never seen it. Which stuns me since I live in Indiana where it takes place. What also stunned me was discovering that this movie is 36 years old! Where has the time gone?

If you’ve never seen the film you’re in for a treat. It tells the story of Dave (Dennis Christopher) a small town boy in Bloomington, IN, who after high school graduation becomes obsessed with the Italian bicycling team. Peddling through town all the time, making his father (Paul Dooley) crazy by speaking with an Italian accent and enjoying himself is all Dave does.

He also spends time hanging out with his three best friends, Mike (Dennis Quaid), Cyril (Daniel Stern) and Moocher (Jackie Earle Haley). All of them are dealing with what to do with their lives. In the past the odds are they would have worked in the local quarries drilling and cutting limestone. But that industry is fading fast. Each has their own worries as well. Cyril has a near non-existent father, Moocher is in love and considering marriage and Mike seems to constantly want to face off against the well to do college kids who come to their town for 4 years and then move on to something better. He wants that chance but doesn’t have that opportunity.

The back and forth between the townie (who the college kids call “cutters” because of their limestone factory roots) and the college kids is what sets up most of the movie. Dave takes an interest in a pretty college co-ed named Katherine (Robyn Douglas) while still in his Italian acting mode. The college kids continue to look down their noses at the “cutters”. And Mike is always in search of a fight, be it trying to show he can dive into the local quarry better than they can or in an actual fist fight in their college cafeteria.

That fight ends in a challenge and offer from the president of the college (IU in case you were wondering). The annual Little 500 Race is fast approaching, a bike race comprised of teams from various fraternities and independent student teams. He decides to include the cutters in the race as well. Dave’s friends are determined they can win with Dave’s abilities. But Dave is having problems of his own, dealing with growing up especially after an encounter with his heroes. Can the cutters win?

The movie does a fantastic job of capturing the down home realness of what it’s like to live in the Midwest and what it’s like to witness the changes in economy based on businesses that are dying all around this country. It also captures the beauty of the locations seen in the film as well. And while the college kids may come off as caricatures the interaction between them and the cutters is well played.

The acting in the film is a sight to behold as well. Christopher never again acted as well as he does here, or if he did he never got the parts that would have solidified him in star status. Quaid captures your eyes each and every time he’s on screen with a character who is boiling just underneath at all times, resentful of the cards life has dealt him. Stern takes on the comedic character he did for years after starting here. And Haley shows that he can hold his own with all of them, something that no one took seriously till years later.

But for me the stand out performance in this film, the biggest reason to see it, is that of Paul Dooley as Dave’s dad. With just a few comments and looks Dooley can make you laugh out loud. Later as he reminisces about the days when he worked at the quarry, when he talks to Dave about what the buildings on the college campus mean to him as he looks at the limestone used in them, he offers a depth of character that you wouldn’t think possible in this man. And when his displeasure at his son’s preoccupation with bicycle racing turns to enthusiasm during the race you find yourself boosted with emotion. Between what is happening at the race and Dooley’s change of heart, if you don’t find yourself rooting for the cutters then something is wrong with you.

The movie won the Oscar that year for writer Steve Tesich whose work was not near as extensive as you would expect. IMDB shows only 10 movies written by him before he passed away at the age of 54. That’s a shame because after seeing how wonderful this movie is (as well as AMERICAN FLYERS written several years later) it makes you think of all he could have done. As it is there is this film to enjoy time and time again. It is a true American classic.

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