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QUIZ

Gold Medal Movies

Test your knowledge of the Olympics on the silver screen

By Sean Monkman

The Olympics are the world’s greatest athletic spectacle, full of intrigue, excitement and unforgettable moments. Such rich source material has fuelled both memorable documentaries and ambitious feature films about the glories of the Games. For filmmakers lacking a historical hook, the Olympics have lent an enticing backdrop for stories in need of a higher, faster, stronger lift towards thrills and substance. It has been the movies based in fact, though, that have delivered the acme of athletic drama. With that in mind — and this year’s Winter Games in full swing in Turin — don’t get left behind the pack. On your mark, get set, go!

1. A movie about two British runners prepping for Paris’s 1924 Summer Olympic Games won four Oscars in 1981, including best picture, best original screenplay and best original score, for a theme song by Vangelis. Name the film.
	Prefontaine
	Without Limits
	Chariots of Fire
	Running Brave
	On the Edge

2. What happens in the surrealist Olympic satire Million Dollar Legs (1932), starring W.C. Fields?
	The nearly bankrupt country of Klopstokia, whose athletic citizenry can leap over houses and outrun motorcycles, enters the Games. Hilarity ensues.
	A kangaroo enters the long jump. Mirth follows.
	The mob has the fix in for the U.S. soccer team. Amusement develops.
	A woman enters the decathlon disguised as a man. Jollity proceeds.
	A swimming horse enters the 100-metre freestyle. Glee is the consequence.

3. What actor — arguably the silver screen’s best-known Tarzan — won five gold medals in swimming at the 1924 and 1928 Summer Olympics?
	Buster Crabbe
	Johnny Weissmuller
	Lex Barker
	Bruce Bennett
	Glenn Morris

4. The documentary Olympia, sometimes interpreted as Nazi propaganda (although produced at the behest of the International Olympic Committee), tells the story of the 1936 Summer Games in Berlin. What legendary German filmmaker directed it?
	Fritz Lang
	Werner Herzog
	F.W. Murnau
	Leni Riefenstahl
	Rainer Werner Fassbinder

5. Fill in the blank: Screen legend Cary Grant’s final role came in the movie Walk, Don’t Run. This Three’s Company-esque romantic comedy was framed around a housing shortage during the 1964 Summer Games, which were held in _____.
	Mexico City
	Rome
	Montreal
	Athens
	Tokyo

6. Downhill Racer (1969) tells the story of a stubborn U.S. skier who wins an Olympic gold medal. At the time, its star actor’s career was just gaining momentum; now, he is widely known as a golden boy film festival founder. Who is he?
	Jack Nicholson
	Robert Redford
	Burt Reynolds
	William Shatner
	Peter Fonda

7. Miracle (2004) recounts Team U.S.A.’s stunning hockey victory over the U.S.S.R. at Lake Placid’s 1980 Winter Games. Play-by-play announcer Al Michaels’s famous “Do you believe in miracles?” call was utilized in its original form, but Michaels and his broadcast partner — a former NHLer and current member of Canadian Parliament — re-recorded most of their work on the game for the movie. Who was Michaels’s colour commentator?
	Ken Linseman
	Ken Baumgartner
	Ken Dryden
	Ken Daneyko
	Ken Wregget

8. In The Cutting Edge, frosty figure skater Kate Moseley (Moira Kelly) blows her chance for glory at the 1988 Winter Games in Calgary. But romance blossoms with her new partner, a fish out of water named Doug Dorsey (D.B. Sweeney). An eye injury had forced Dorsey to give up what sport?
	Hockey
	Luge
	Ski Jumping
	Bobsled
	Curling

9. What country’s bobsledding participation in the 1988 Winter Games in Calgary inspired the John Candy classic Cool Runnings?
	Cuba
	Dominican Republic
	Barbados
	The Bahamas
	Jamaica

10. One Day in September won the 2000 Oscar for best documentary. What dark moment in Olympic history does it recount?
	The Ben Johnson drug scandal at the 1998 Summer Games in Seoul
	The disqualification of a Soviet pentathlete for using a rigged épée during a fencing competition at the 1976 Summer Games in Montreal
	The massacre of 11 Israeli athletes at the 1972 Summer Games in Munich
	The 1904 marathon champion who hitched a ride in a car for 11 miles of his race
	The emperor Nero being declared chariot-racing champion in A.D. 67, despite falling out of his carriage and not finishing the race