I AM BOLT

UK, 2016, 107 minutes, Colour.
Usain Bolt, Palais, Serena Williams, Sebastien Coe, Yohan Blake, Ziggy Marley, Chronixx.
Directed by Benjamin Turner, Gabriel Turner

While there was no one in the world without doubt who Usain Bolt was at the time the film was released, future interest will depend on how well an audience is aware of Bolt, his talent, his career, his record Olympic gold medals…

This is a British documentary about Bolt, the fastest man alive. It shows him as an athlete but it also shows him, quite strongly, as a person.

The film serves as a biography, outlining Bolt’s Jamaican background, his birth in 1987, the portrait of his mother and father and their comments about him as well is their watching his achievement in the Olympics, his life at school, his sport success, the initial coaches and their prognostications, training him. There are also a number of talking heads with his friends, filling in his background as well as their personal esteem of him.

While the film shows him as a teenager, it is when he is about 20 that he starts to win gold medals and starts to break records. The film has a great deal of video footage and records of his sprints.

While the film, outlining his career, opens at track events in Beijing in 2015, there are quite a lot of flashbacks, and the earlier part of the film showing the races in Beijing and his gold medals; the flashbacks to the London Olympics occur in the latter part of the film, no less exciting even though one knows the results, just having the opportunity to watch the races from various angles, hear Bolt’s comments on them afterwards, and all with speeds under 10 seconds.

The film indicates that Bolt can be nervous before events, but he seems a fairly calm personality, with religious undertones and invocation of God, enjoying partying and mixing with people, finding the ascetic discipline for sports very difficult, but able to submit himself to the rules and regulations for the regimen. His personal coach makes a lot of appearances, giving information about training, health, demands, and seems a very genial personality.

Prior to the Rio Olympics, Bolt seem to be at wary of participating but, according to the film, all of which was being made during the years preceding Rio, Bolt listens to Justin Gatlin, who had been disqualified for drug offences, but had made a comeback expecting to beat Bolt but failing to win the events. He broadcast a challenge before Rio, Bolt accepting – and, of course, ultimately succeeding.

There was also injury before Rio which required him to have some time off, go to a doctor in Germany who understood his injuries and was able to diagnose what was wrong and help him to recovery.

The film is interested in the talking heads who give their testimony, sports personalitires like the Brazilians footballers Peke and Reyer, like friend and four times Olympic gold winner, Serena Williams, Lord Sebastien Coe, as well as commentators and Jamaican musicians like Ziggy Marley and Chrionxx from Jamaican media (and scenes of jubilant celebrations in the streets). These are combined with the biography sequences as well as the training sequences, keeping audience interest.

Bolt had achieved his record nine gold medals before the age of 30. After the film was released, it was revealed that one of the runners in the 2012 4 x 100 m relay was found to be influenced by drugs and the gold medal withdrawn – which Bolt took rather philosophically.

For those interested in sports, this film is a must. For those not interested in sport – it is almost a must.