The “Four Minute Mile” was an inspiring film about an underdog. It was first a film festival movie that did so well that it was released in the theaters afterwards. Usually when a movie does well at film festivals it means it is a low budget short film or documentary that did well and everyone should see it. Gravitas did a good job picking this film to be shown in theaters.
The films centers around one high school kid name Drew Jacobs and his struggles at home as well at school involving after an afternoon activity. He has always been running his whole life even as a kid. The film even says he’s the fast kid in the neighborhood. It’s the typical underdog movie about a kid from a broken home; as his dad dies of a drug overdose and his older brother who is a drug dealer is on parole. His mom struggles to keep things in order, a single parent barely making ends meet. His brother like their father before is in a shady business of drugs, who ropes Drew into dropping off cash payments to a shady local drug dealer. Which clearly doesn’t seem to be a good idea or what will come of it at the end?
He also is dealing with being a kid of a single mom with no money so he can’t afford college the normal way by getting a track scholarship, his only way to go to college. He has a run in with the coach of the track team leading him to get kicked off. Now what will he do? Before he gets kicked off the team he and others wonder what the story is with the old guy watching their practices, they know he is the former coach.
It’s also about the good-hearted kid from the wrong side of the tracks, having Coach Coleman the mentor seeking his own redemption who’s an alcoholic, by training the kid with talent to get where he couldn’t get to. They do a good job making that relationship go from bad to good, and the kid learning to respect Coleman and trust his methods even if they seem strange. Coleman sees something special in Drew and offers to teach him everything he knows—granted that he changes his event from the 440 to the mile, and that he strives to run that distance in a punishing four minutes. As Drew is in need of a father figure, Coleman is in need of a son after his son who was a talented runner himself was killed in a car accident. It’s all extremely convenient. You wonder if they both will make it and improve their own life stories.
Some of the weird training methods he made him do were: running 15-second sprints through ankle-deep water, dragging a giant tire from one side of a swimming pool to the other, and doing quarter-mile laps around the docks instead of the slick and shiny track. You pull for him not to end up like his dad or older brother and that he gets the girl on the track team he likes. But tragedy strikes right before the biggest race of his life, and forces him to confront everything that has been holding him back.
So in the end it is an underdog story about a runner on a high school track team meeting up with an unorthodox coach to help him stay away from the misery of a broken home and drugs. You will pull for him to come out on top at the end. I give the movie 3 out of 4 stars. Good story and plot with good acting and a good ending. Some moments made you cry and some made you laugh and smile.
Kelly Blatz as Drew Jacobs
Richard Jenkins as Coleman
Cam Gigandet as Wes Jacobs
Kim Basinger as Claire Jacobs
Analeigh Tipton as Lisa
Rhys Coiro as Eli
Director
Charles-Olivier Michaud Writer