The first long forgotten BP contender I watched was the sports feel-good dramedy "Breaking Away". It chronicled the rise, fall, and rise of a boy who wants to become a cyclist after he graduates high school. He starts acting Italian to be like his favorite Italian cyclists. His antics piss off his parents but wins him a girl by saying he's a foreign exchange student.
The story and dialogue is a bit hokey along with the dated direction by Peter Yates. Yates falls into the trap many 70s movies fall into with regards to zooms: they use it way too much. In some instances, the direction is inspiring and lifts the story higher, but other times it's simply bland. A lot of the blandness comes from the muted color palette. There many yellows and... more yellows. Nothing really stands out. The sub-plots also seem to not really support the story nor the conflicts. Why do we care if Jackie Earl Haley gets married to some random chick? I don't. However, the movie still has a sweet spot in the middle and sure enough, after the lofty beginning, you begin to cheer him on with each race we see. Hell, the end race even had my heart pounding.
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