The film starts in the 1960 Summer Olympics in Rome, where a coach says "Bhaag Milkha Bhaag!" The story is taken back to the memories of the childhood days of a young boy which haunted him, resulting in him dropping to fourth. Partition of India in 1947 caused chaos which resulted in mass religious violence in Punjab in British India, killing the parents of Milkha Singh (Farhan Akhtar). He reaches Delhi and later meets his sister there. Living in impoverished refugee camps, Milkha soon makes friends and survives by stealing along with his friends. He falls in love with Biro (Sonam Kapoor), but she asks him to live a life of honesty.
A reporter interviews Paan Singh Tomar (played by Irrfan), a dacoit who is in the news for killing 9 people of a community. Answering questions about himself, the story goes in a flashback in year 1950. Paan Singh works in the Army while his wife and mother live in Morena. He surprises his seniors in the Army with his athletic skills. Though he was not interested in sports, he joins the sports division because there were no limits on their diet. Picked for the 5000 metres race's training, he was persuaded to run for the 3000 metre steeplechase by his coach. He participates in the Indian National Games and wins the gold medal in the steeplechase event 7 years in a row. In 1958 he participates in the Asian Games at Tokyo, but couldn't win because of his inability to adjust with the track spikes only given to him in the final event. He felt frustrated when he was not allowed to go the borders to fight in the 1962 and 1965 wars because sportsmen were not allowed to fight in them. In 1967, he participated in the International Military Games and wins the gold medal in the steeplechase.
A young man with autism, named Cho-won, finds release only in running. As a child, Cho-won regularly threw tantrums, bit himself, and refused to communicate with others—finding solace only in zebras and the Korean snack, choco pie. His mother never gave up on him and was determined to prove to the world that her child can be normal. As Cho-won gets older, he begins to find a passion for running and his mother is there to encourage and support him. Even though their family suffers from financial difficulties, they find a former marathon champion, Jung-wook — now a lethargic older man with an alcohol problem.
La première partie d'Olympia, un documentaire sur les Jeux olympiques de 1936 à Berlin, réalisé par la réalisatrice allemande Leni Riefenstahl. Le film a été projeté dans les salles en 1938 et à nouveau en 1952 après la chute du régime nazi.
Bugs apparaît et lit le titre. Il défie Cécil dans une course. Cette dernière appelle toute sa famille et la dispose à des endroits stratégiques. Bugs, surpris, accélère sa course mais perd et rencontre les sosies de Cécil à la fin et se rend compte de la supercherie.
The year is 1928 in Gyeong-seong (modern-day Seoul), Korea. Young Kim Jun-shik (Shin Sang-yeob), his father (Chun Ho-jin) and sister Eun-soo (Jo Min-ah) work on the farm of the Hasegawa family (Sano Shiro, Nakamura Kumi) in Japanese-occupied Korea. Both Jun-shik and young Hasegawa Tatsuo (Sung Yoo-bin) are interested in running; by the time they are teenagers (Do Ji-han, Kobayashi Yukichi), they have become fierce competitors. Tatsuo's grandfather (Natsuyagi Isao) is killed in a bomb attack by a Korean freedom fighter, and subsequently a Korean runner, Sohn Kee-chung (Yoon Hee-won), wins a marathon race against Japanese competitors, further inflaming Korean-Japanese tensions.
The film opens with Colin Smith (Tom Courtenay) running, alone, along a bleak country road somewhere in rural England. In a brief voiceover, Colin tells us that running is the way his family has always coped with the world's troubles, but that in the end, the runner is always alone and cut off from spectators, left to deal with life on his own.
In 1987, in Boise, ID football coach Jim White is chastising his players for an underwhelming half. Jim gets into a verbal altercation with one of the players, resulting in Jim throwing a football shoe with cleats at him. Following this incident, Jim is forced to move with his wife, Cheryl, and two daughters, Julie and Jamie. They settle down in McFarland, California, a predominantly Hispanic town. On their first night there, the family goes to a small restaurant and leaves to find a large gathering of Latinos in cars surrounding the place. One man makes suggestive motions toward Julie, prompting the family to leave faster.
Western Australia, May 1915. Archie Hamilton (Mark Lee), an 18-year-old stockman and prize-winning sprinter, longs to enlist in the Australian Imperial Force. He is trained by his uncle Jack (Bill Kerr) and idolises Harry Lascelles, the world champion over 100 yards. Archie wins a race with a bullying farmhand, Les McCann (Harold Hopkins), Archie running bare-foot and Les riding his horse bareback.
In the beginning of the film, a brief overview of the history of the marathon is shown, with footage of dramatic races involving Dorando Pietri, Abebe Bikila and Rod Dixon. Notable marathoners such as Frank Shorter, Dick Beardsley, Alberto Salazar, Grete Waitz, Paula Radcliffe, Joan Benoit-Samuelson, and Kathrine Switzer provide commentary about the sport.
This fictional story centers on Ralph Walker, a teenager attending a Catholic private school. His father was killed in World War II and his mother is hospitalized with an unidentified illness. Ralph is naturally prone to mischief and often finds himself an outcast among his classmates. He tries to emulate the conduct of grown ups, and is caught smoking cigarettes and masturbating by headmaster Father Fitzpatrick. Already labeled a troublemaker, Ralph is forced to join the school's cross country team to relieve him of his excess energy.
The film opens showing Louis "Louie" Zamperini flying as a bombardier of a United States Army Air Forces B-24 Liberator bomber, during an April 1943 bombing mission against the Japanese-held island of Nauru. The plane is badly damaged in combat, with a number of the crew injured. The hydraulics of the plane are shot and damaged, but the pilot, Phil, manages to bring it to a stop at the end of the runway thanks to a flat tire.
Le documentaire suit trois champions encore en activité au moment du tournage, l'Éthiopien Haile Gebreselassie, l'Allemande Heike Drechsler et le Marocain Hicham El Guerrouj. Ils commentent leurs performances, leur passion de leur discipline et de leur pays.
The focus of the film is on the seven runners participating in the Rome Marathon. Shots of the marathon are interspersed with interviews and documentary footage of the runners. Running experts who are not involved directly in the race are also interviewed. The experts include American authors Hal Higdon, Jeff Galloway, John Bingham, and Roger Robinson. American runners Bill Rodgers, Frank Shorter, Nina Kuscsik, Kathrine Switzer, Mary Wittenberg, and Rod Dixon are also interviewed. Italian runners Gelindo Bordin, Orlando Pizzolato, and Stefano Baldini are interviewed, as well as former world record holder, Ethiopian Haile Gebrselassie, British world-record holder Paula Radcliffe, and Norwegian Grete Waitz.