A Black athlete competing in Olympics during 1936 when Nazi’s are emerging as a superpower threatening to take over the world with their dangerous racial beliefs against a Jews and people of color. The theme of the story based on a black athlete struggling against the powers to be like elite white Americans and the Aryan Race pushovers like Nazis earns the attention to imagine what the world was during those days. This is a story of a human being who would have made big if not for the wrong time and wrong place. Sports are suppose to keep the politics outside however with the struggle between Blacks against racial bias was pretty evident in those times.
Jessie Owens who was married with a baby daughter was studying in the Ohio State University to grab the opportunity for competing in track race with the help of the coach who admires the talent irrespective of the color of the skin. Jessie wins a lot of games for his school and then is finally a front runner for Olympic games in Berlin.
This is where all the problems start appearing for Jessie where the US government thinks on boycotting the games and Jessie too thinks of boycotting Olympics and the story goes on describing his experience. Finally he does go to Berlin and there he faces the negative vibes from German athletes. The whole German administration bend their backs to make the Olympics in such a way in order to impress the Fuhrer and the appearance of black athlete on Berlin’s race track is somewhat causes awkwardness there.
This movie is a bit slow but it is worth watching for the acting of Stephen James as Jessie. This movie is more about the political reflection of the society of those times. One can easily take an inspiration from this real life character who navigated through such pressurized circumstances back home in america and then in Germany.