Film: 'On Any Sunday' (1971)

This is a really lovely film. Directed and narrated by the brilliant Bruce Brown, king of the surf movie, it captures a few glorious, golden (and sometimes mud-stained) moments in the exhilarating world of motorcycle racing. From the surreal beauty of the Bonneville salt flats to the frigid wastes of Quebec in winter; from Florida to Spain; from thigh-deep mudholes to the 30-degree banks of the Daytona speedway, on any Sunday, someone, somewhere, is racing - some to win, some for the hell of it, some because they can, and some because they can't imagine doing anything else. As a fan of both two-wheeled vehicles and those very sweet-natured early-'70s sports documentaries, I delighted in the joyful tone of Brown's celebration of all levels of racing, from the mesmerisingly hair-raising high speed AMA championship events to the ridiculously silly (though still hair-raising) Widowmaker hill climb event. Whether or not you care much for motorbikes or racing, I think it's nearly always a pleasure to watch people who are very, very good at something perform, and this is a prime example of why: