A Short Film About Running With Poetry By W.H. Auden

In 1962, Canada’s National Film Board commissioned a first-time director to make an 11-minute, black-and-white movie about 19-year-old distance runner Bruce Kidd who would later become an Olympian. Runner is no average runner biopic: with a jumpy jazz soundtrack complemented by legendary poet W.H. Auden’s poetic meditations on the beauty of running, the film is a reminder that running is natural, sleek, and in a word, cool. Auden’s script was read by Don Francks, a Canadian musician and actor who also happened to be my neighbour in the 1970s.



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