American Flyers DVD

American Flyers is one of those movie quandaries, not from the perspective of the movie, but for how it was marketed in the UK. Rights owners Warner for some unbeknown reason chose not to let British cinema audiences see American Fliers; however it was featured in trailers at Cannon cinemas for almost half a year. Then a larger publicity campaign took place on Video. All MGM (now Sony) and Warner rental videocassettes featured American Fliers trailers ...
...the UK in DVD form, American Flyers still has not been released this side of the water, and its highly unlikely it will.

Onto the movie itself made in 1984, and released in 1985 American Flyers is arguably one the last sporting movies made; The story circles around the Sommers family, and a curse that has effected them. Some years before the story begins the two boys Marcus and David’s father died. Choosing not to stick around due ... more

American Flyers is one of those movie quandaries, not from the perspective of the movie, but for how it was marketed in the UK. Rights owners Warner for some unbeknown reason chose not to let British cinema audiences see American Fliers; however it was featured in trailers at Cannon cinemas for almost half a year. Then a larger publicity campaign took place on Video. All MGM (now Sony) and Warner rental videocassettes featured American Fliers trailers for a legendary year and a half. Six month prior to video release and a year after release. More oddly with so much publicity very few VHS videos were actually released. Meaning that over here many people had to wait a further 4 years before the movie hit television screens in 1989. In another incredibly strange twist of fate, the TV channel showing the movie, ITV; chose to show the movie at the ungodly hour of 3 a.m. so if reading this the movie does not seem familiar to you that now you’ll know why. In another twist of fate while small ridiculous movies have been released in the UK in DVD form, American Flyers still has not been released this side of the water, and its highly unlikely it will.

Onto the movie itself made in 1984, and released in 1985 American Flyers is arguably one the last sporting movies made; The story circles around the Sommers family, and a curse that has effected them. Some years before the story begins the two boys Marcus and David’s father died. Choosing not to stick around due to his mother’s lack of compassion over the situation; Marcus up and left moving many miles away and setting up a new life for himself, leaving David behind. David a bit of a sad loner spends his days riding a bike round St Louis, Missouri, imagining himself racing in a massive bike race. But of late David has become obsessed with the death of his father, since learning that the disease that took his father could be hereditary; David is convinced that the disease has struck him.

Out of the blue Marcus returns to take David away with him; it seems that David is not the only one concerned about this disease. Tricking David into taking an endurance test in the sports medicine centre that Marcus works at, he and his boss use the excuse to check if David has the disease. As a dark shadow spreads across the family Marcus persuades David that everything is fine and that they should race in The Hell Of The West; America’s most gruelling bicycle race. This three day race brings the brothers closer together, but with this dark shadow ever present a doorknob holds the real truth behind this illness.

American Flyers features a strong cast: David Marshall Grant an actor I always feel was disastrously underused, and one that never seems to age; here are the age of 30 in real life Grant has to star as a young man in his late teens who’s studying is going all to pot. His brother who was supposed to be five years senior was played by Kevin Costner, who had to grow a moustache in order top create the look of maturity, in reality both actors were the same age. Add to the flavour the presence of ever popular 80’s actress Rae Dawn Chong, another underestimated movie star seldom used after the 80’s made way for the 90’s. Chong had a massive collection of movies that all hit UK shores at the same time, Commando, Soul Man and The Colour Purple; here she plays Marcus’s hard but compassionate girlfriend Sarah. Alexandra Paul pops up as Becky a hitch-hiker the trio pick up on the way to the first race. I guess I must ad mention of a then pretty much unknown Jennifer Grey who went on to appear as Baby in Dirty Dancing, and actress who now bears no resemblance to how she looked in the 80’s. Acclaimed director John Badham took the helm of the movie in between two smash hits Wargames and Short Circuit.

The movie in short is a no-brainer, it’s a sensible watch with a lighter than light storyline. This however does not make it less watchable, I remember back in the 80’s thinking that the idea of the movie was just a new breed of fresh Hell, but in the cold light of day it’s a fast paced moving story. The story itself is knitted so tightly that while initially the runtime of almost two hours seems daunting, the movie passes incredibly quickly, and personally I was disappointed when it ended. The most bizarre element of the movie is that from the 40th minute until the 95th minute, time flashes past with such speed I at first had to question if my machine was faulty.

Each of the cast endears themselves to you on some level, even Costner it seems that playing the same character in every movie actually worked here; but then I guess this was before he was famous with only a few movies under his belt, Fandango being the best of the worst. Grant is by far the character you relate to the most, imagine living your life under the fear that at any time you could quite simply drop down dead. Ironically with this floating over his head it seems that David pushes himself way beyond the limits of most men.

I think the reason the movie works so well is due to variety of different emotions the cast take you on. From the offset you have doom and gloom, followed by a few comedy moments. Then you have a level of achievement, quickly followed by doom and gloom, light comedy, outstanding performance, doom and gloom, before the final aggressive scene of the final race. Cram all these elements into a movie, with each segment being quite dramatically different from the last and you can understand why the film moves at such a great pace. Emotionally to a certain aspect it’s a very moving film, but not the sort that will drive you to tears. So guys considering watching this movie you have no fears about a weepier moment where you might have to pretend to have an itchy eye.

From an action point of view, the bike races are incredibly well shot. Camera work moves impressively from parallel shots which include great close ups and audible dialogue, all the time the image remaining clean and straight; to impressive overhead shots that bring in the size of the race and the impressive backdrops. Backdrops being a key issue for me, I felt that I could literally feel the surroundings, it’s a much more innocent view of America which so often to us in the UK nowadays we see so little of, It seems most movies focus on the grittiness and the danger element that seems less and less the sort of lifestyle we want to live.

Very little work was put into the DVD release, it does not feature that clean a print; in fact it looks very much like a brand new VHS tape in respect of quality. The sound is presented in a mono format, and the DVD comes in full screen ration.

You can only get American Flyers in Region 1 format, meaning you’ll need a multi region DVD player in order to see it. But its an affordable DVD which you’ll pick up with great ease from Amazon, Ebay, or Playusa.com for about £5. The DVD has no special features, not even a trailer. But even with that in mind its well worth your £5 expenditure, it’s a movie that 10 year olds or 60 year olds will enjoy, with no real nudity (just suggested in places), it has a typical Sunday afternoon feel about it. 

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