Movie DVD review: Going for gold, 1948 Olympics, BBC

"Going for gold" takes place in at 1948 Olympics in London and is a story of one of the three gold medals won by the British.  Six weeks before the games the British sculling was burning with the desire to win a gold medal and did not think any of the current teams could do it. They put together a new team of two men who from different worlds - a boat builder's son Bert Bushnell and Oxford educated Richard Burnell. They had different approaching to sculling strategy and life which they had to overcome to win a gold a medal. 

I enjoy watching sports and the premise of the movie sounded interesting to me. I found the movie to be Okay (not bad, but not something I would watch again). I did not find it as compelling as Chariots of Fire which has a similar story line. The conflicts were simple, predicable in both content and resolution. I never felt fully connected and vested in the characters. On the positive side I enjoy watching Olympics and knowing that it is based on a true story made this story interesting.

The DVD comes with the feature film as well as 1948 Olympics Trivia Game, which I really enjoyed even though it ranked me as "Rubbish". It was quite educational and the ranking trully reflected my lack of knowledge of Olympic history of that period.  The movie runs approximately 90 minutes and has optional English subtitles.

I received a review copy of the DVD to write an honest and unbiased review and this review reflects both both pluses and minuses of my experience watching this movie.

You can find it on Amazon by following this link.


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