Jamaica Takes to the Ice in Cool Runnings

Author's Rating:

Pros: entertaining, fun for the whole family, loosely based on actual events, good acting

Cons: can be a little hokey at times

The Bottom Line: 
Great feel-good film for the whole family

Author's Review
You know, I think the people of Jamaica must see just about everything, it’s like a small town that comprises a whole country…that is, everything except snow.

Derice Bannock (Leon) is a Jamaican sprinter, one of the fastest ever seen who can best even his gold-medalist father’s winning times. Now Derice is heading into the qualifying race for the summer Olympics and is sure of being the best…that is, until someone trips him and another man when he himself stumbles, insuring that none of the three will see their Olympic dreams realized.

But Derice doesn’t give up that easily. When he spies a picture of his father standing next to a white man, both wearing gold medals, and he is told that the man had a crazy idea about using Jamaican sprinters to form a bobsled team the gears in his mind start grinding.

The years haven’t been kind to this man who was once an Olympic champion…Irv Blitzer (John Candy) is bitter, washed-up, overweight, and happy to waste away in a Jamaican bar for the rest of his days. Fortunately our intrepid hero will not take no for an answer and finally pesters Blitzer into at least trying to put a team together. Bannock and his best friend Sanka (Doug E. Doug) hold a meeting to find two more members for their team and end up with only two choices; Yul Brenner (Malik Yoba), a muscle-bound and bald-headed man who was the other to get tripped in the sprinting tryouts, and Junior Bevil (Rawle D. Lewis), a cowed and runty sprinter who happens to be the one that tripped the two.

Through many obstacles the team finally makes it to the frozen wastes of Canada for the winter games, and while they’re more concerned about keeping from freezing to death than anything else their opponents sneer at their obvious inexperience and the Olympic officials try their best to keep the team off the track…namely because of old animosity aimed at Blitzer, who had moved to Jamaica after losing his medals when he was caught cheating. They’ve never seen snow before. They’ve never been in cold weather or tried to walk on ice. Heck, they don’t even have a sled. Now that they’ve come this far will they even be able to compete?

Looking through my lists I couldn’t believe that I’ve neglected to review Cool Runnings…this is one of my favorite movies that a friend of mine made me watch when I was 14 and I’ve enjoyed watching it again and again ever since. While not entirely child-appropriate this film has very little foul language that is well below what most kids hear on the street every day and aside from language it’s great for all ages.

It’s not very often anymore (and granted, 1993 is hardly a recent film) that you get a film that actually has a bit of a moral to it (in this case regarding respect and striving against all odds), it’s even loosely based on actual events. From what I hear very loosely, but they did an excellent job of turning out a well-acted and hilarious tale about an unusual bobsled team. The acting is very good, this is one of the last movies John Candy ever did and definitely one of his best…it was followed by Canadian Bacon and Wagons East! (Candy died before filming for that movie was complete) but his acting in this outshone both of those by leaps and bounds.

Overall this is certainly one of the most entertaining family-friendly movies I’ve ever had the pleasure of seeing and I even had it in my personal collection (that is, until it walked off with my roommates girlfriend before I filled that particular capacity) and plan on buying another copy of it as soon as finances allow. If you’re looking for a family-friendly film (aside from the mild foul language) this is a perfect one to keep all entertained.