The Loneliness of the Long Distance Runner (1962)

Alan Sillitoe's autobiographical novel about a rebellious 18-year-old living in dreary Lancashire proved to be the perfect material for Tony Richardson to adapt in the early 1960s. The film stars Tom Courtenay as the disaffected Colin Smith, who ends up in a Borstal, or reform school, after robbing a bakery. The Governor (Sir Michael Redgrave), the institution's chief authority, believes in physical training as a means of rehabilitating his charges. Despite his contempt for all authority, Colin one day inadvertently outruns the school's leading long-distance runner, and the Governor immediately assigns him to be ...
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trained for an imminent competition with a well-known public school. During his solitary training exercises, Colin flashes back to scenes of his chaotic youth: his father, a blue-collar worker dying of cancer, and his mother, a foul-mouthed harridan, blowing the insurance settlement on a new lover and a new TV. On the day of the big race, the two schools must share a locker room, and Gunthorpe (James Fox), the captain of the opposing team, reflexively wishes Colin good luck. The surprised boy looks at him as though these are the only words of encouragement he's ever received. Courtenay is exceptional in his film debut, exuding the bitterness typical of the director's early "angry young man" films. Employing jump cuts and undercranked scenes borrowed from the Nouvelle Vague, the film emphasizes the oppressiveness of the boy's environment and the temporary freedom that running offers him.
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One of the key "angry young man" films which helped define the British "Kitchen Sink Drama" style of the late 1950's and early 60's, this story centers on Colin Smith (Tom Courtenay), a bitter young man from a working-class family. Uninterested in school and determined not to follow his father into factory work, Colin and his friend Mike (James Bolam) make their pocket money through petty crime, until they're arrested after the robbery of a baker's shop and sentenced to Borstal (British reform school). The Governor of the school (Michael Redgrave) takes a keen interest in Colin, but he cares less for his rehabili...
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tation than his gifts as a broken-field runner; Colin finds himself torn between the need to please his captors and his determination not to play along with what he sees as a corrupt system. The Loneliness Of The Long Distance Runner was the first film for Courtenay, whose performance earned him the "Most Promising Newcomer" prize at the 1962 British Film Academy awards.
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Colin Smith is een jeugdige delinquent, die gepakt wordt tijdens een overval. Hij wordt naar Borstal, een jeugdinstelling gestuurd. Zijn naam rijst daar snel doordat hij een enorm talent voor hardlopen heeft. Ook de directeur van de instelling merkt dit op en wil met Colin een loopwedstrijd winnen tegen een rivaliserende tuchtschool. Tijdens zijn lange trainingen krijgt Colin de mogelijkheid diep na te denken over zijn leven.

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