Atletu / The Athlete (Davey Frankel & Rasselas Lakew, 2009): USA/Germany/Ethiopia/Bulgaria/Norway

Reviewed by Paula Gomez. Viewed at the Santa Barbara International Film Festival, 2010.

The spirit of true athleticism stands out in The Athlete, a biographical movie about a renowned athlete and his struggles to surpass his obstacles in order to get back on the track and win a race once more. It is an empowering and inspirational piece that will surely please the individual interested in athletic competition. This movie was viewed at the Santa Barbara International Film Festival.

Rasselas Lakew, co-directs, co-writes and plays the life of Abebe Bikila, an Olympic marathon champion from Ethiopia. Abebe Bikila appears riding his car on a long road in Ethiopia reminiscing about his triumphs and tribulations during his peak years as an athlete. He remembers his triumph at the Olympics in Rome in which he raced barefooted and won, as well as the Olympics in Mexico in which he didn’t come out as number one. It seems that his last Olympics he considered his performance to be a failure, for after having been number one before anything less than first place was unacceptable to him as well as to some of his arrogant countrymen. Abebe suddenly has an accident on the road that leaves him semi-paralyzed and his life takes another turn. He goes on living and learning to appreciate what success and failure can mean from another point of view.

The theme of perseverance is prevalent in this movie. Triumph under challenging circumstances is what Abebe seems to try to accomplish throughout his life. In one scene taken from actual stock footage, he is running the marathon in Rome barefoot, since he refused to compete with his new shoes because they hurt him. On another scene, he sees a horse on the road, which has been blinded by his previous owner, and instead of shooting him to spare him of his misery he decides to let him live and fight for his life. Abebe is seen persevering and succeeding even against adversity.

The road that he travels through in Ethiopia is symbolic to the track he used to run through as a marathon runner. It takes him to the countryside where there is no one else but himself. He feels powerful and in a way invincible again as if he is still running that marathon in Mexico but this time he has more control of whether he wins or not for he is his own judge. Including the stock footage of his races in the middle of the movie made a great stylistic difference in this biographical film. Unlike other biographies where stock footage is not implemented until the end, such as in Ray, this film allows the viewer to constantly remind themselves that this person’s story was real. It connects the audience to the story at a much more intimate level. Another point that made this movie seems very plausible was the crisp color of the current world of the movie versus the grainy looking stock footage.

This is the story of a male role model from Ethiopia, and his greatest achievements as an athlete under adverse circumstances. Anyone who is a fan of the Olympic games will enjoy this film. An athlete going on a trip of self-discovery will also enjoy this film and be very pleased that he or she has not be the only one who has gone on this type of trip before.