[ad_1]
REVIEW: The massive success of F1: Drive To Survive sure does have Netflix excited about the potential of sports documentary series that follow teams through a season.
After the golf series Full Swing romped up the algorithm this year, I guess a show that follows the fortunes of different riders, coaches and team owners over the 21 gruelling days of a Tour de France is an idea whose time has come.
Tour de France: Unchained does a pretty great job. The people in the show are as compelling and eccentric (read: bonkers) as professional sports people have to be.
Plus, cycling is an intensely dangerous sport. These men are risking injury at least, as they belt along at 70kmh or more, with only a millimetre of lycra between them and those French cobblestones, tree trunks, spectators and chase cars.
The camera work in Unchained is extraordinary. Even 10 years ago, ultra-light, ultra-small cameras that could be mounted on helmets and handlebars couldn’t have delivered pictures in this resolution.
Supplied
The interviews might be as superfluous and semi-scripted as the ones in F1: Drive To Survive, but the race footage in Tour de France: Unchained is maybe even more spectacular than its petrol-burning cousin.
When the peloton breaks away in Unchained, or a crash causes chaos on the road ahead, the cameras and mics at the film-makers’ disposal are there to record every pixel of it.
The interviews might be as superfluous and semi-scripted as the ones in Drive To Survive, but the race footage in Unchained is maybe even more spectacular than its petrol-burning cousin. Recommended.
Tour de France: Unchained is now available to stream on Netflix.
[ad_2]