A commercial American movie with a real feeling for its Midwestern locale, and an unsentimental generosity towards its characters.

| Original Score: 3/4 | Sep 23, 2024

A textbook definition of a sleeper hit.

| Original Score: 3.5/4 | Oct 11, 2021

Part coming of age comedy, part underdog sports tale, and part glimpse into small-town America, the film is an effortless joy as it explores a tight friendship approaching the inevitable.

| Mar 14, 2021

It's very, very much worth seeing.

| Mar 14, 2021

Director Peter Yates's delightfully unpredictable comedy uses a local bicycle race to uncover the sexual, class and economic tensions within an all-American community.

| Original Score: 4/5 | Mar 14, 2021

I seriously can't imagine anyone not liking it.

| Original Score: 4/4 | Mar 14, 2021

It manages to be pleasant and upbeat, even as it focuses on the pessimism of uncertain futures and the stresses of small town tedium.

| Original Score: 9/10 | Aug 27, 2020

Rousing bicycle race story is a family favorite.

| Original Score: 4/5 | Dec 18, 2010

Breaking Away embraces the good old fashioned small town family values that would catapult Ronald Reagan to an enormously popular two term presidency. And still, I like it.

| Original Score: 78/100 | Jul 22, 2010

The triumphant ending teeters on twee, but feels warranted enough to give it a pass and enjoy the moment right along with him.

| Original Score: 66/100 | Mar 12, 2010

There are a few moments when the picture's easygoing pace turns into wobbliness, but these are insignificant compared with its many moments of shrewd insight into the lives of amusingly shaded but very recognizable human beings.

| Aug 3, 2008

Christopher is so good in this quietly charming, Yates-drected tale of four high school graduates trying to decide what to do with their lives that it's a wonder he didn't achieve the heights of co-star Quaid.

| Aug 3, 2008

A delightful sleeper.

| Original Score: 4/4 | Mar 21, 2007

Though its plot wins no points for originality, Breaking Away is a thoroughly delightful light comedy.

| Mar 21, 2007

Peter Yates, previously typed as an action director, lends the film a fine, unexpected limpidity, and the principals are mostly excellent.

| Mar 21, 2007

The screenplay by Oscar-winner Steve Tesich sometimes turns a little precious, but the character and atmosphere is so firmly established that it all works out.

| Original Score: 3/4 | Feb 10, 2007

Full Review | Original Score: 3/5 | Nov 5, 2006

Displays the kind of unsentimental optimism that went out of fashion with Hawks.

| Jun 24, 2006

This charming Oscar-winning comedy shows sensitivity to American peculiarities and eccentricities, perhaps due to the fact that it was scripted by a writer of foreign descent, Tesich.

| Original Score: B+ | May 5, 2006

Despite a reasonably fun performance from Daniel Stern, Dennis Quaid earnest overacting sinks what could have been a quaint film about middle America.

Full Review | Original Score: 3/5 | Feb 23, 2006