Sport has become a dominant global cultural form and therefore, with increasing frequency, a cinematic subject. This ground-breaking book is the first to focus on sport in documentary film as a significant aspect of sport in culture and to argue for the importance of the sports documentary as a valuable social and cultural text.

The book offers a comprehensive overview and critical evaluation of the sports documentary tradition around the world, from Soviet propaganda films of the 1920s through Olympia, Hoop Dreams, When We Were Kings and One Day in September to alternative contemporary classics such as Zidane: A Twenty-first Century Portrait. Combining new research with clear, explicatory overviews, the book explores issues of identity, representation and power, and introduces the concept of the ‘visual sociological imagination’ as an approach to the study of sport in film. Including an appendix offering a practical guide to techniques of criticism and review in film studies, this book is essential reading for any student or scholar with an interest in sport, film and culture.