July 26 - Experience cycling as it was meant to be: from the comfort of a lawn chair
This free film showing is put on by Indy Parks. Movies start at dusk (around 9:15). This one’s 100 minutes long, so plan on staying around until 11.
“Breaking Away” is one of the classics of the ’70s. The film, which won Best Screenplay at the 1979 Academy Awards, chronicles the life of a young aspiring cyclist named Dave Stoller and his three hapless friends as they adjust to life as townies in Bloomington, Indiana. Dave agonizes over going to college, falling in love, and not being Italian, immortalizing the joys of cycling in celluloid.
The parks department is screening this one at the Major Taylor Velodrome, an unusual place for the Movies in the Park series. The Velodrome is a 333 1/3-meter-long smooth concrete biking track with banked turns, one of only 18 in the United States, and has hosted all kinds of bike races. But there can be no better place to view “Breaking Away,” which was filmed entirely in Indiana, using IU students as extras in the climactic Little 500 scene.
The Major Taylor Velodrome
3649 Cold Spring Rd., Indianapolis, IN 46222
Phone: 317-327-8356
