The Devil At Your Heels
Another crazy Canadian. This is a guy who jumps cars for a living. He buys junkers, pops the windows out, and then with a running start, uses a ramp to see how many lined-up cars he can fly his junker over (usually a dozen). He does that twice a night until he breaks a bone as he crashes into the last car. After 20 years and many injuries this small-time circus gets boring so he is seized by a big dream: to jump a car one mile. Over a river. A river that separates the US and Canada. So for the next 5 years his life is consumed as he spends millions of dollars of other people’s money building this gigantic impossible ramp 200 feet into the air on the edge of the St. Lawrence River, while every possible thing that can go wrong with his rocket car goes wrong. Even the great Evel Knievel visits and advises him to give up. Nothing stops him from trying, and nothing prepares you for the shock of the surprise ending. Oh my gosh.
— KK
Devil at Your Heels
Directed by Robert Fortier
1981, 103 min
$27, DVD
Watch film for free at NFB.
Read more about the film at Wikipedia
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