Steve McQueen takes you for a drive in the country. The country is France. The drive is at 200 MPH!


Steve McQueen is ideally cast as a champion race car driver, participating in the famed 24-hour race headquartered in Le Mans, France. Though dedicated to Going for the Gold, McQueen finds time to romance widowed Elga Andersen. The dramatic angle to this plot wrinkle is that McQueen may well have been responsible for the death of Andersen's husband during a previous car pile-up. Director John Sturges, who'd previously helmed Steve McQueen's legendary motorcycle chase scenes in The Great Escape, was originally slated to direct Le Mans, but withdrew from the project; it was then taken over by Lee H. Katzin of The Phynx


Le Mans is a 1971 action film directed by Lee H. Katzin. Starring Steve McQueen, it features footage from the actual 1970 24 Hours of Le Mans auto race.
The film is today still popular among race fans as it is a relatively accurate depiction of the era, with a lot of racing but very little dialogue (there is brief dialogue approximately 6 minutes into the film, then the PA announcer at 11 minutes, more PA announcements at 14 minutes, with McQueen's first dialogue at 36 minutes into the film). Due to this, and partly to the American market's general low awareness and disregard of the Le Mans 24-hour race, as well as European auto racing in general, it was a flop at the box office there. It followed in the wake of the similar but much more successful 1966 film Grand Prix (which McQueen had turned down the starring role which was then given to James Garner).

Despite the film's lack of success, the film now has a large cult following as it is considered difficult to replicate realistic racing scenes without the use of CGI and without an over-dependency on stunt doubles. Also the film tends to be used as a referencing point by motorsport and car media, when referring to the race itself. For example, at the time of the film’s release, a pitwall was added for the safety of pit crews as other circuits already had similar set-ups. Although the pit lane has been commonly used as a referencing point in the film, it was unpopular with both drivers and pit personnel for being cramped as well as difficult to get cars in and out of the pits, even when repairs were needed. It wasn't until following the 1990 race that the outdated pit lane was demolished in favor of a modern complex which is still in use today. In addition, the 1970 race was the first in which the famous Le Mans "running start", in which the drivers lined up against the pit wall and ran to their cars as the flag was dropped, was not used. Instead, the race started with the drivers already strapped into the cars. The previous year, Jacky Ickx had made his famous protest against the danger of the traditional start by waiting for all of the other drivers to run to their cars and start the race, before walking to his car and fastening his seat belt carefully before joining the fray and eventually winning the race with co-driver Jackie Oliver.
Ickx's protest was in fear that a driver could be seriously injured or even killed if involved in a crash soon after the start and they had not secured their seat belt correctly in their haste to get a fast start. This unfortunately came true on the first lap of that same 1969 race when British driver John Woolfe crashed his Porsche 917 at Maison Blanche and was killed.


Release Date: June 23, 1971 @ Loews State

Distrib: National General Pictures