With the Olympics just over a month away, it’s time to improve your sporting knowledge with our Olympic-themed film and TV festival. We’ve (almost) found a movie, TV series or documentary to match all 28 events featured at the Paris Games. On your marks, get set, go!
Jennifer Lawrence takes aim as Katniss Everdeen in the film The Hunger Games.
ARCHERY
What better way to start your pre-Olympic film and TV festival than with the bloodthirsty teens of The Hunger Games (Netflix, Amazon Prime Video, Foxtel, Stan*). As Katniss Everdeen, Jennifer Lawrence wields a bow and arrow with deadly precision. For your bonus round, choose any Geena Davis film in honour of the American actor nearly qualifying for the Sydney Olympics in archery.
ARTISTIC GYMNASTICS
A teenager is sentenced by a judge to return to the world of competitive gymnastics in 2006 dramedy Stick It (Stan). Oscar winner Jeff Bridges takes the pay cheque, playing the tough coach. For something a little more realistic, documentary Simone Biles Rising (Netflix, July) follows the multiple US champion and Olympic gold medal winner on her return to the sport and journey to Paris.
Swimming with Men with Rob Brydon, Jim Carter and Rupert Graves.
ARTISTIC SWIMMING
Not one, not two, but three movies about a men’s synchronised swimming team! I’m talking Brit flick Swimming With Men (Apple TV), French comedy Le Grand Bain (Apple TV) and Swedish comedy Allt flyter. All are loosely based on the real-life Swedish men’s swimming group Stockholm Art Swim Gents. That’s a lot of budgie smugglers.
ATHLETICS
OK, so this category covers all sorts of running, walking, jumping and throwing. The classic is Chariots of Fire (Disney+) for middle-distance running; for the marathon, it’s Forrest Gump (Netflix, Binge, Stan, Paramount+); and don’t forget British hammer throwing champion Miss Trunchbull in Roald Dahl’s Matilda the Musical (Netflix). For a goosebump-inducing experience, relive Cathy Freeman’s 400-metre gold medal triumph at the Sydney Olympics with the superb documentary Freeman (ABC iview).
The film Chariots of Fire was based on the true story of Harold Abrahams and Eric Liddell at the 1924 Olympics.
BADMINTON
This is a longshot, but there’s a 1993 French-British spy thriller called Shuttlecock. Unfortunately, it has nothing to do with the actual sport. But – stick with me – did you know the Australian badminton team is called the Falcons? Which means you can sub in Greta Gerwig’s marvellous Lady Bird (Netflix, Amazon Prime Video, Binge) or Black Hawk Down (Foxtel).
BASKETBALL
Our Boomers star in Rose Gold (ABC iview), the documentary that tracked the Australian men’s basketball team on their way to a history-making bronze medal at Tokyo. For basketball nerds, there’s the Chicago Bulls documentary The Last Dance (Netflix), which infamously snubbed Australian NBA champ Luc Longley, part of the Boomers squad in three Olympics (you can catch his story on Australian Story on ABC iview).
BASKETBALL 3X3
A 10-minute, three-a-side game played on the half court and pronounced three-ex-three. Urgh. Try White Men Can’t Jump (Disney+).
BEACH VOLLEYBALL
Top Gun. You know what I’m talking about. Take your sweaty, sandy pick with either the 1986 original (Netflix, Binge, Stan, Foxtel, Paramount+) or the 2022 sequel Top Gun: Maverick (Netflix, Paramount+).
BOXING
Get in the ring with Russell Crowe in Cinderella Man (Disney+), Hilary Swank in Million Dollar Baby (Stan) or Robert De Niro in Raging Bull (SBS on Demand). For a true icon, don’t miss Ken Burns’ masterful documentary Muhammad Ali (Foxtel), which follows the champion from his beginnings at his local gym, through to his gold medal at Rome in 1960, his banishment for refusing to fight in Vietnam, his return to the ring, political activism and death from Parkinson’s disease.
Russell Crowe and Paul Giamatti talk tactics in 2005’s Cinderella Man. Credit: Alamy Stock Photo
BREAK DANCING
Does Breaking Bad (Stan) count? Or scour your local second-hand store for a VHS copy of 1984’s Breakin’ 2: Electric Boogaloo. Pick up the original Breakin’ if you see it. And then buy a video recorder.
CANOE SLALOM
Get the banjo out, it’s Deliverance (Apple TV).
CANOE SPRINT
British TV series The Thief, His Wife and the Canoe (Foxtel) is based on the true story of a man paddling into the North Sea to fake his own death. This will not be happening at the Olympics.
Angelo D’Angelo as PJ, James Lugton as Goose and Nicole Kidman as Judy in BMX Bandits.
CYCLING BMX FREESTYLE
BMX Bandits (Amazon Prime Video, Paramount+). Hand in your passport if you haven’t seen it already.
CYCLING BMX RACING
Incredibly moving documentary Ride (ABC iview) follows former Australian Olympian Sam Willoughby, who broke his neck a few weeks after competing at the 2012 London Games. He now coaches his American wife, Alise, a two-time BMX racing world champion, who heads to Paris for her third Olympics.
CYCLING MOUNTAIN BIKE
Not technically mountain biking, but Kevin Costner and his fine, furry moustache ride through the Rocky Mountains in American Flyers (Apple TV).
Kevin Costner (left) and David Grant saddle up for American Flyers.Credit: Getty Images
CYCLING ROAD
The ideal Olympics warm up is the Tour de France (SBS) from June 29, or watch Tour de France: Unchained (Netflix), the fly-on-the-wall series that follows the epic race and its skin-shredding crashes.
CYCLING TRACK
More cycling? Good grief. Please forgive some category fraud as we go with the documentary The Last Rider (Stan), which follows US champion Greg LeMond and his great comeback victory in the 1989 Tour de France. Olympics link: LeMond was selected to represent the US at Moscow in 1980, but didn’t get to compete because of the US boycott against the then Soviet Union.
DIVING
Mexican drama Dive (Amazon Prime Video) follows Mariel, who has one last shot at the Olympics. The production won best actress and best TV movie/series at the 2023 International Emmy Awards.
EQUESTRIAN
Saddle up with French film Jappeloup (Apple TV), which follows the real-life story of a small show jumping horse that went to the Olympics. Or try your luck in the op shops for a copy of International Velvet, as the plot has eerie parallels to Australia’s gold-medal-winning success in eventing at Atlanta in 1996.
FENCING
Pierce Brosnan, with Madonna’s help, pulls out his sabre for an epic duel against peak Bond villain Gustav Graves in Die Another Day (Stan). Fun fact: The fight was choreographed by former UK Olympic fencer Bob Anderson, who doubled for Darth Vader in the lightsaber duels in The Empire Strikes Back and Return of the Jedi (both on Disney+).
FOOTBALL
Take your pick from duelling Matildas documentaries, Matildas: The World At Our Feet (Disney+) or Trailblazers (Stan), or just Bend it Like Beckham (Foxtel). And then watch Beckham (Netflix).
The Matildas rise is chronicled in the documentary Matildas: The World at Our Feet.
GOLF
For the boring, real-life stuff, there’s fly-on-the-wall series Full Swing (Netflix), for the fun stuff there’s Tin Cup (Binge) and for Matt Damon in baggy golf pants, there’s The Legend of Bagger Vance (Disney+).
HANDBALL
What about Hardball (ABC iview)?
HOCKEY
Indian screen icon Shah Rukh Khan stars in Chak De! India (Amazon Prime Video), a classic underdog sports story inspired by the Indian women’s field hockey team’s victory at the 2002 Commonwealth Games.
Keanu Reeves loves puppies and judo in John Wick.
JUDO
Keanu Reeves trained in judo and jiu jitsu to play the puppy-loving assassin in bloody revenge fest John Wick (Amazon Prime Video, Foxtel, Stan).
MARATHON SWIMMING
Annette Bening and Jodie Foster were nominated for Academy Awards for their roles in Nyad (Netflix), which is based on the real-life swimming exploits of Diana Nyad (Bening), who decided, at age 60, to swim non-stop from Cuba to Florida.
Annette Bening hits the water as marathon swimmer Diana Nyad in the biopic Nyad.
MODERN PENTATHLON
Chloe Esposito was the first Australian to claim gold in this completely bonkers endurance event at the 2016 Rio Olympics. Comprising fencing, freestyle swimming, equestrian show jumping, pistol shooting and cross country running, it was apparently inspired by a messenger in Napoleon’s army. How convenient then, that Ridley Scott made a film last year called Napoleon (Apple TV+).
RHYTHMIC GYMNASTICS
Yes, it’s more category fraud, but you find me a movie about rhythmic gymnastics! Made-for-TV biopic Nadia was once my school holiday obsession, as it told the story of Romanian gymnast Nadia Comaneci, who at 14 became the first woman to score a perfect 10 at Montreal in 1976.
Bruce Herbelin-Earle (from left) Callum Turner and Jack Mulhern row, row, row their boat in The Boys in the Boat.
ROWING
George Clooney loves an old-timey, old-man movie, and The Boys in the Boat (Amazon Prime Video), which he directed, ticks those sepia-toned boxes. It follows the University of Washington rowing team and their dream to compete in the 1936 Olympics. Joel Edgerton pops in.
RUGBY SEVENS
Two movies – Invictus (Binge, Foxtel) and The Brighton Miracle (Google Play) – but since they are both about 15-a-side rugby, maybe watch them with one eye shut and, voila, it’s Sevens!
Matt Damon
SAILING
The boat bits of Tom Hanks in Cast Away (Netflix, Binge, Paramount+, Foxtel, Stan), or relive Jessica Watson’s thrilling solo voyage around the world in biopic True Spirit (Netflix).
SHOOTING
I’m going with Jason Bourne here. Any of them.
SKATEBOARDING
You can’t go past cult classic Lords of Dogtown (Apple TV), which captures California’s 1970s skateboarding scene and stars Heath Ledger.
Heath Ledger as Skip Engblom in Lords of Dogtown.
SPORT CLIMBING
Essentially, it’s rock climbing split into three formats (bouldering, speed and lead). Your best option is the thrilling and completely crazy Oscar-winning documentary Free Solo (Disney+) that tracks US climber Alex Honnold on his mission to climb the El Capitan route in Yosemite National Park.
SURFING
Point Break (SBS on Demand). Always and ever.
Muriel Heslop (Toni Colette) with her South African beau David Van Arkle (Daniel Lapaine) in Muriel’s Wedding, Credit: House and Moorhouse Films
SWIMMING
Two wildly different Australian options: Barracuda (Apple TV), which was adapted from Christos Tsolkas’ novel and follows Melbourne high school student Danny Kelly, who uses a swimming scholarship to try to escape his working-class background; and Muriel’s Wedding (Amazon Prime Video, Foxtel, Stan), where our heroine enters into a sham marriage so her South African-born beau can swim for Australia in the Olympics.
TABLE TENNIS
More Forrest Gump! Our hero picks up the ping pong bat while recovering from a gunshot wound in Vietnam. He becomes so good he’s sent to play in China as part of the “ping pong diplomacy team”.
Forrest Gump (Tom Hanks) keeps his eye on the ping pong ball. Credit: Sunset Boulevard
TAEKWONDO
I’m down for the count here and throwing in The Karate Kid (Netflix, Binge, 7plus) and Cobra Kai (Netflix) for (crane) kicks.
TENNIS
Where do I start! Delightfully unrealistic romcom Wimbledon (Foxtel, Paramount+) and even sillier psycho-sexual thriller Challengers (now in cinemas) are good fun, King Richard (Foxtel) somehow decides Richard Williams is more interesting than his prodigy daughters Venus and Serena, while the slightly boring series Break Point (Netflix) serves up a behind-the-scenes look at the top players.
Kirsten Dunst serves up some romcom fun in Wimbledon.
TRAMPOLINE
Geoffrey Rush in Shine (Amazon Prime Video), anyone?
TRIATHLON
Step back in time with Aussie classic The Coolangatta Gold (Foxtel), starring a young Colin Friels as an aspiring Iron Man who must beat Grant Kenny – PLAYING HIMSELF – to be crowned the champion. Yes, it was a box office flop, but it did give us the glorious The Late Show parody The Bermagui Bronze (“Come third like a real Australian!”).
VOLLEYBALL
It’s Barbie (Netflix, Binge). Can you feel the Ken-ergy?
WATER POLO
You can’t beat the Eastern Europeans for grim, and that’s especially true of Hungarian drama Children of Glory, which manages to mix water polo with the 1956 Hungarian Revolution and the Melbourne Olympics.
WEIGHTLIFTING
The classic 1977 documentary Pumping Iron (Netflix, Amazon Prime Video, Stan) is not strictly about weightlifting, but more about what happens if you lift a LOT of weights. It also introduced Arnold Schwarzenegger to the world, as he prepared to compete for the Mr Universe and Mr Olympia titles.
Steve Carell and Channing Tatum in wrestling drama Foxcatcher.
WRESTLING
And a legitimate Olympic movie to finish with! Foxcatcher (Amazon Prime Video, Foxtel, Stan, SBS on Demand) stars Steve Carell at his creepy best, playing real-life wrestling enthusiast John du Pont, whose manipulation of US Olympic gold medal-winning brothers Mark and David Schultz (Channing Tatum and Mark Ruffalo) ended in tragedy.
Did we miss any sporting classics? Do you know of a movie featuring rhythmic gymnastics? What’s your favourite Olympic event on screen? Let us know in the comments below.
*Stan is owned by Nine, the publisher of this masthead.
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