MARINONI: THE FIRE IN THE FRAME (Tony Girardin). 87 minutes. Subtitled. Opens Friday (March 27). For venues and times, see Movies. Rating: NNNN
If a documentary is only as good as its subject, then Marinoni: The Fire In The Frame is golden. Tony Girardin has a fantastic one in 75-year-old Giuseppe Marinoni – a cranky but revered Montreal manufacturer of bicycle frames determined to set a world distance record for his age group.
Here, he’s training for his 2012 date with destiny, which will involve a trip back to his native Italy and an hour of furious cycling. The trial is held on an indoor track, and he’ll be going full-out for 60 minutes straight.
There’s a great deal of history to be unpacked, both in terms of Marinoni’s life story and the bike he’s riding – a frame he designed in the late 70s for Canadian cycling legend Jocelyn Lovell. Girardin folds Lovell’s own tragic story into Marinoni’s, shaping the movie’s narrative into something more thoughtful than most sports docs.
But, then, this is hardly a sports documentary. Its subject is happier caring for his chickens and foraging for mushrooms than he is talking about himself, and there are moments when the irascible Marinoni’s annoyance with Girardin’s camera makes the picture feel like an uneasy buddy comedy. That’s a good thing, too.
