![]() Robert Towne's affecting "Personal Best" (1982) told the story of a talented woman runner in terms of both her sport and her romantic involvement with another woman athlete Prefontaine is more interesting as a public figure than a private one. I prefer the earlier approach, which contains more information about why Pre is important even today. He makes no attempts to win friends, and in "Prefontaine" he tells a press conference: "To hell with love of country I'm looking out for me." "Without Limits" is less interested in the politics and the crusade, and sees Pre more in personal, psychological terms. Potter portrayed the real-life character Mary Marckx, Prefontaines girlfriend who saw a side of him that not many people knew. Other countries support their athletes, and Pre leads a campaign to reform America's rules. There's also good work by Monica Potter as Mary Marckx, Prefontaine's most significant of many girlfriends, in what could have been simply a pretty-girl part. Pre returns to Oregon as an amateur who is expected to work at menial jobs (he becomes a bartender) and live at the poverty line (he gets a mobile home) while training for the next Olympics. Everything leads up to the 1972 Munich Olympics, marred by the terrorist attack on Israeli athletes.īut the point of the story is contained in the epilogue. We follow his progress from record to record, and from girlfriend to girlfriend (Mary Marckx, played by Monica Potter, is the true love, but he shuts her out of his life). The earlier film points out that his legs were short for a runner, and of unequal length this one sees him more as naturally gifted, but heedless with his talent. Sutherland brings a deep patience to Bowerman, who understands that running is a matter of endurance and strategy, as well as heart: "Men of Oregon, I invite you to become students of your events." Pre thinks heart is enough and explains his success simply: "I can endure more pain than anyone you've ever met." The film follows Pre from his early sports failures (he was no good at football) and into running, where he quickly drew attention. "What do you think a track coach does, Pre?" he asks at one point, since Pre seems to think the coach's primary function is to frustrate him. Watching the way he gently tries to direct his headstrong young star, we are seeing a version of Phil Jackson's Zen and the art of coaching. ![]() Towne's film is less quirky, more a conventional sports movie, but it benefits by giving more attention to the relationship between Pre and Bowerman.Īnd Sutherland's performance is the film's treasure. It makes it clear that a late invitational meet in Oregon with Finnish athletes was held as a deliberate challenge to the amateur establishment. The earlier film focuses more on Prefontaine's stubborn battle with the Amateur Athletic Union and other amateur bodies that essentially dictated the terms under which Americans could run. ![]()
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