In the landscape of Irish sport, Handball is an island within an island. Once hugely popular, it has since fallen into obscurity. Today the countryside is littered with abandoned alleys and crumbling old walls, the remains of a once great game whose time would appear to have passed. Less than 10,000 players remain. These athletes strive for immortality in a game most consider “dead”.
This chronicle of the Christchurch Commonwealth Games marked one of the National Film Unit's most ambitious productions. Though a range of events (including famous runs by John Walker and Dick Tayler), are covered, the film often bypasses the pomp and glory approach; instead it dares to talk to the injured and mention that most competitors lose. The closing ceremonies of the "friendly games" feature the athletes gathering to — as the official song's chorus put it — "join together". Four directors joined together to work on it: Arthur Everard, John King, Paul Maunder and Sam Pillsbury.
The tiny village in the far north of Sweden called Ensamheten (Solitude) has sixteen inhabitants. They all share an unusual passion - armwrestling.
In 1954, before his senior year of high school, Wilt Chamberlain took a summer job that would change his life, working as a bellhop at Kutsher's Country Club, a Jewish resort in the Catskill Mountains. An unexplored and pivotal chapter in the life of one of basketball's greatest players, and a fascinating glimpse of a time when a very different era of basketball met the Borscht Belt in its heyday.
In the 1970s the city of Milwaukee hired an artist to paint the Bucks' floor. More than 30 years later, Bucks fan Andy Gorzalski puts his family's credit card down for $20k to protect this iconic symbol of the city's history.
Avid for steep slopes, Marco Siffredi (1979-2002) obeys only one rule: not to fall. This gifted kid with hair sometimes blond peroxidized, green or blue clashed in his valley: Chamonix, mecca of mountaineering. His thing was to go up and down on a snowboard. . 90 minutes September 8, 2002, altitude 8848 meters, rare oxygen, his head already brushing the sky and his snowboard running, Marco Siffredi, 23, rushes from the summit of Everest in the Horbein corridor and its slopes at 50 degrees . A year earlier, he had already made the first descent of the mountain on a snowboard. But there remains another corridor… more direct. It's not a challenge, just a reason to be... However, that day, at the top of the roof of the world, his trace is lost...
Bruce Brown's The Endless Summer is one of the first and most influential surf movies of all time. The film documents American surfers Mike Hynson and Robert August as they travel the world during California’s winter (which, back in 1965 was off-season for surfing) in search of the perfect wave and ultimately, an endless summer.
La Meilleure Façon de tracer
An in-depth look into the isolated sport of Motocross in the much more isolated island of Bermuda.
It is 1 p.m. on June 30, 1982, when Christophe Profit, 24, shows up at the foot of Les Drus with his pof bag, his climbing shoes and nothing else. He will try the west face of Les Drus in "solo", in the Mont Blanc massif by "Directe Américaine", 1100 meters of vertical and smooth rock. Christophe will achieve the feat of climbing the wall in free solo, without using a rope or any belaying technique. At 4:10 p.m., barely more than three hours after the start of his ascent, the new climbing star can embrace the Virgin of the Drus at the same time as the career of a high-level mountaineer. Three years later, on July 25, 1985, he climbed the north faces of the Matterhorn, the Eiger and the Jorasses in the same day. Awarded at many mountain film festivals, this great documentary is a magnificent testimony to one man's passion for climbing, the mountains and adventure.
Sport documentary
Before Lance Armstrong, there was Greg LeMond, who is now the first and only American to win the Tour de France. In this engrossing documentary, LeMond looks back at the pivotal 1986 Tour, and his increasingly vicious rivalry with friend, teammate, and mentor Bernard Hinault. The reigning Tour champion and brutal competitor known as “The Badger,” Hinault ‘promised’ to help LeMond to his first victory, in return for LeMond supporting him in the previous year. But in a sport that purports to reward teamwork, it’s really every man for himself.
Using home videos from fans from across the globe and never-before-seen drone footage obtained during the victory parade in Buenos Aires, on streets dyed white and sky blue. The film invites viewers to immerse themselves in the world's most football obsessed nation, Argentina, to relive the emotional rollercoaster that was the country’s 2022 World Cup victory in Qatar and the record breaking celebrations that followed.
England thrash Australia in the fifth Test at the Oval - but still lose the Ashes.
From the director of Generation Iron, comes the anticipated sequel that will depict 5 of the top bodybuilding and fitness mega-stars on a quest of achieving the ultimate physique and taking it to the next extreme level. In the world of social media and internet, the rules have changed as to what makes an iconic bodybuilding mass-monster. Starring Kai Greene, Calum Von Moger, Rich Piana, among others, this film will explore an all new generation of bodybuilders and how this new world, and new people, carve their own path to physique perfection.
This is the story of Guy Roux and how he managed to bring the modest A.J. Auxerre to the top of professional french football league.
The TV Now documentary “King Klopp - Meistermacher, Motivator, Mensch” gives exciting insights into the life of football coach Jürgen Klopp. After 30 years, Klopp is finally leading Liverpool FC to the title again - fulfilling the dream of an entire generation of fans in a football-crazy city. How did Klopp develop from a second division player to a coaching legend? Contemporaries tell stories from the life of an extraordinary person who considers himself fairly normal.
Rare archive footage and Jocky Wilson's own words tell the story of the rise and fall of a cult Scottish sportman. Featuring interviews with his friends and darts contemporaries.
Real Madrid, the football club with the most Champions League titles, is undertaking a unique renovation of its stadium. The new Santiago Bernabéu will have a metallic facade, retractable roof, 360º video scoreboard, and a logistics ring. It will be the first stadium to store the pitch underground with a revolutionary system, all while continuing to host matches, pushing engineering to the limit.
Chris Sharma's latest masterpiece in Mallorca, Black Pearl, could be his hardest deep water solo yet, joining his earlier routes Es Pontas, Alasha, and Big Fish in the pantheon of iconic "psicobloc" lines. Follow his journey to bring the project to life, along with side trips to rad new crags, and mega sessions with Matty Hong and Jernej Kruder vying for the second ascent of the spectacular Big Fish.