Top Cycling Movies
It's time to get the popcorn out! Our pick of cycling movies has it all, from big budget productions to cult classics and cheeky mockumentaries.
Breaking Away (1979)
As cycling grew ever more popular in the US, it was only a matter of time before Hollywood made a major picture on the sport. Enter Breaking Away — director Peter Yates’ coming-of-age tale about a group of friends in Bloomington, Indiana.
Among their ranks is promising amateur cyclist and Italophile, Dave Stoller (Dennis Christopher), who worships Italian cycling and renames the family dog Fellini (much to his father’s annoyance). Disparagingly referred to as ‘cutters’ by the lndiana University students, because of Bloomington’s stonecutting history, the friends have several hostile encounters with the snobbish students, culminating in a cycle showdown at the university’s Little 500 race — a real event that takes place on campus each year.
Breaking Away won an Academy Award for best original screenplay.
Watch the trailer for Breaking Away here
The Program (2015)
The biopic of disgraced Tour de France racer Lance Armstrong begins like a fairy tale, although one with doping and cancer, but ends as a Shakespearean tragedy. This biopic was directed by Academy Award nominee Stephen Frears and stars Jesse Plemons, Chris O'Dowd and Dustin Hoffman.
If you look very carefully the vintage bicycle being ridden in some scenes were actually props made by Condor Cycles with period correct silver components.
American Flyers (1985)
The writer of Breaking Away, Steve Tesich, turned his had to writing another cycling fiction film, American Flyers (1985), which featured a moustachioed, pre-stardom Kevin Costner. It didn’t replicate the success of Breaking Away, but still has a place in the history of cycling films. Make sure you check out the classic 'wheelie scene'.
Belle Renedez-Vous (2003)
A deliriously demented vintage cabaret show by the triplets of Belleville sets the tone for this French animated picture (known as The Triplets of Belleville in some countries) by Sylvain Chomet. It’s the story of a young boy called Champion who lives a lonely life with his grandmother, Madame Souza, and only begins to realise his potential when he receives the gift of a bicycle.
The Flying Scotsman (2006)
In this 2006 British biopic, Jonny Lee Miller plays the Scottish cyclist Graeme Obree, who twice held the World Hour Record and was World Champion in the 4000m pursuit in 1993 and 1995. The film depicts Obree’s battle with the establishment — represented here by the fictional cycling body the World Cycling Federation (WCF) — to be able to use his innovative bike ‘Old Faithful’, made from washing machine parts.
Premium Rush (2012)
Hollywood turned to New York’s cycle couriers for the basis of Premium Rush. The movie stars Joseph Gordan-Levitt of Batman, Inception and Lincoln fame. He plays a bicycle messenger who gets tangled up in a dodgy deal and dirty cops. It is as hammy as a butcher’s shop. There are skids, wheelies and plenty of reds lights being jumped. The plot is thin but it moves at joyous speed and contains plenty of bicycles, so we can’t be too picky.
Tour de Pharmacy (2017)
Comedian Andy Samberg pokes fun at pro cycling's longstanding issues of doping in the sport. Tour de Pharmacy is a mockumentary with a starry cast of Hollywood favourites including Orlando Bloom as an Italian cyclist, Kevin Bacon as the president of the UCI, muscle man John Cena and Jeff Goldblum. Like any good mockumentary it is bonkers and takes a merciless look those involved in cycling.
BMX Bandits (1983)
Two Australian expert BMX bikers and a friend (a teenage Nicole Kidman) become entangled with a group of murderous bank robbers. The robbers become furious when they discover that the kids sold the radios to purchase new bikes and equipment, and resort to any means to catch them.
Check out Nicole Kidman producing some series BMX skills in this clip on YouTube.
Cycling Documentaries
These cycling documentaries take a closer look inside cycling and cyclesport. Charting the stories of some of the greatest riders in the world. There is also a must-see Oscar winning documentary that blew open state sponsored doping in Russia.
Vive Le Tour (1962)
In 1962, French director, Louis Malle, made an 18-minute documentary of the Tour de France. This quick-cutting film is an intimate portrait of the sport and the rigours of the Tour, seen through the eyes of the everyday man. It also serves to highlight the difference in attitudes to sport nutrition between the 60s and today, with the support riders or ‘water carriers’ stopping at bars to gather red wine, champagne and beer for the rest of the team. Malle’s film is a short but important piece of cycling documentary history.
Watch the film on YouTube
A Sunday in Hell (1976)
Available to watch on YouTube, A Sunday in Hell captures what it’s like to be inside (or on the fringes of) a bike race—in this case, the 1976 edition of Paris-Roubaix—like nothing before or since. It also never gets old to watch Merckx, De Vlaemnick, Maartens, and Moser racing in their primes on some of the most beautiful bikes ever built. This is what it was like to race in the seventies before technology and science helped riders battle the toughest course in cyclesport.
Tour de France - Unchained (Netflix)
From the makers of the highly successful F1: Drive to Survive series. Netflix applies the format to the Tour de France and capture the stories, action and drama from the 2022 Tour de France. Season two is already in the works. Unchained is a great way to relive the Tour and go deeper into some of the lives of the 120 riders who make up the most famous bike race in the world.
Least Expected Day - Inside Movistar Team (2019)
The Least Expected Day is a Spanish-language production available on Netflix that takes a look inside Team Movistar, exploring the drama—much of which is centered around their team leaders like Nairo Quintana, Enric Mas, and Richard Carapaz—and the team’s characters, such as their larger-than-life team manager Eusebio Unzúe.
Icarus (2017)
On 9 December 2019, Russia was handed a four year-ban from all major sporting events by the World Anti-Doping Agency (WADA). It means a Russian flag and anthem were not be allowed at the Tokyo 2020 Olympics, Paralympics, or football's 2022 World Cup.
So how did that come to light and how did WADA find out about state sponsored doping?
Rewind to 2015 when filmmaker, Bryan Fogel, enlists the help of experts to help him highlight cycling's creaking testing system. One man in his team of consultants is Russian anti-doping official — and eventual Whistleblower — Grigory Rodchenkov. Before Fogel's eyes, the film he set out to make quickly evolves into a dramatic thriller, Oscar winner, and front-row seat to one of the biggest sporting scandals of the decade.
Available to stream on Netflix.
Game Changers (2019)
This documentary film boasts big names as executive producers, including Arnold Schwarzenegger, Jackie Chan, and Lewis Hamilton, and focuses about the misconceptions around eating meat to support physical lifestyle and athletic performance in sport.
Pantani: Death of a Cyclist (2014)
James Erskine's film about the life and death of one Italian legendary cyclist Marco Pantani. The documentary features thrilling footage from the nineties and revealing interviews, even if it can't close the book on the doping allegations surrounding Pantani.
My Italian Secret (2014)
Gino Bartali was a famed Italian Tour de France champion (1938 and 1948) whose true heroism wasn’t recognized until after his death in 2000. During World War II, he hid a Jewish family in his cellar and used his bike training as a cover while he transported anti-Nazi messages to the Italian Resistance. He also risked his life to literally cycle Jewish refugees to safety in a secret-hatched wagon pulled behind his bicycle. This 2014 documentary tells his incredible story.
Adventure Films
Are you ready to be inspired? We've picked a handful of bikepacking and cycling adventure films that follow riders as they use their bicycles to discover more.
Wild Horses: The Silk Road Mountain Race (2019)
Given the prestigious 'Staff Pick' award, clothing brand, PedalEd, follow riders tackling the rugged — and often uncharted — Kyrgyzstan in the inaugural Silk Road Mountain Race.
GBDuro (2019)
Before the UCI sanctioned Gravel Racing as a new category in cycling. Pro Tour team EF Education was sending their rider Lachlan Morton, to tackle alternative adventure races. In this documentary by Rapha he tackles the 2,000km off-road race between Lands End and John o'Groats, not knowing what is in store.
A Call of a Life Time (2023)
The Call of a Life Time is a raw documentary series following the fast-growing off-road racing scene, as it follows racers over the course of the Life Time Grand Prix, which includes landmark gravel event like the Sea Otter Classic, Unbound, the Leadville 100, and Big Sugar Gravel. Some of the toughest riders around riding some of the hardest races on Earth.
Accomplice (2020)
Accomplice is about humankind’s greatest inventions— the bicycle. It showcases of some of the best bike MTB riders and scenery in the world as well as the the relationship between the two always at the center.
Available in some regions on Amazon Prime.
Solo bikepacking around the world: Mind Mapping (2022)
Boru McCullagh, a coach at Herne Hill Velodrome, started bike-packing around the world to experience new places and continue his battle with a major depressive disorder, whilst raising money for mental health charity, MIND. He was followed for parts of his journey by Finnley Newark, who was documenting stories of kindness, culture and the world we live in. Part one covers the journey from the UK to Turkey. Part two covers the journey around Asia and part 3 covers Japan and Australia.