Fitting, isn’t it? The list of short films revolving around motorsports is, indeed, very not-long.
This isn’t by any means a comprehensive list, since there’s plenty that have flown below most people’s radar. But I’ll just highlight a few that were very prominent in one regard or another, whether it was those involved, the subject matter or potential awards consideration.
This is timely, too, given NASCAR debuting its short film Die-Cast Mania on its YouTube page.
The Legend of Hallowdega (2010)
I already wrote about this at length a little over a year ago, but this is the only NASCAR one to make the list. It was directed by Terry Gilliam of Monty Python fame and starred David Arquette, who’s been in countless things, including the Scream franchise.
It revolves around the rumored Native American burial ground that Talladega Superspeedway was built on, which in the world of the short film leads to a paranormal-hunter expedition to the track to find out if ghosts of those long dead are causing crashes there.
Things kind of get crazy, as you’d expect them to, and it concludes with Arquette and a cameraman for the doc getting killed when a tent they’re in is landed on by Elliott Sadler‘s flipping car from 2003.
How did a crash from 2003 impact people in 2010? Gotta be that burial ground.
Dale Earnhardt Jr., of course, ran a paint scheme promoting the short at Talladega in the fall of 2010.
Le Mans 1955 (2018)
Potentially the highest-profile short of these four, Le Mans 1955 had the chance to be nominated at the Academy Awards the following year. Presented in English and French, it chronicles the horrific crash at the ’55 running of the race and the disaster that unfolded. Pierre Levegh crashed during pit stops, and the car essentially exploded into the crowd in that area, killing 83 spectators as well as Levegh.
The short film itself deals with the moral dilemma of continuing the race, specifically within the Mercedes Silver Arrow camp — Levegh was driving one of their cars. The other car was still competitive, piloted by Stirling Moss and Juan Manuel Fangio, but their team manager Alfred Neubauer struggled to decide whether to pull that car from the race.
He eventually did, of course, and it’s decades before Mercedes ever competed in motorsports again. It’s a…
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