Film

The Last American Hero

Name: The Last American Hero
Genre: Drama
Released: 1973
Cast: Jeff Bridges, Valerie Perrine, Geraldine Fitzgerald, Ned Beatty, Gary Busey

Drama

Jeff Bridges plays a moonshine-running Carolina kid who trades bootlegging for stock-car racing in this 1973 drama loosely based on Junior Johnson's rise. It's a portrait of working-class ambition and the cost of leaving your world behind—less a racing film than a character study wrapped in tire smoke and Southern authenticity. Raw, lived-in, for people who love flawed protagonists.

TMDb rating

2.9

Should you watch it?

Watch it if you enjoy character-driven sports stories where the racing is gritty and unglamorous, and a rogue's stubborn pride matters more than the trophy, much like the bootleg-runner tales of 1970s Hollywood.

Skip it if you want a polished, crowd-pleasing underdog arc with clear stakes and fast cuts; this one meanders through its roadside scenes and leans on rough, shaggy texture rather than tidy momentum.

What it asks of you: Ninety-five minutes of loose, ambling scenes with plenty of talk between the races, so it rewards patience and an easy attention to the man rather than the track.

Not sure? Find tonight's pick in a minute.

If you liked this

Two-Lane Blacktop1971

A film that moves at the speed of obsession: two drivers and their Chevy 55 cross America in a race that's really about something else entirely. Hypnotic, almost plotless, totally gripping.

But The pacing is glacial and no one delivers dramatic speeches. If you need story momentum and clear character arcs, this will feel like watching paint dry.

The Great Northfield Minnesota Raid1972

Another early-70s outlaw saga about men who think they're tougher than history. Directed by Phil Kaufman, it has the same gritty realism and the same eye for how ambition corrodes from the inside.

But It's a Jesse James film, not a racing film, so the surface is completely different. Some may find it too violent and morally murky.

The Great Northfield Minnesota Raid poster

Vanishing Point1971

A driver obsessed with reaching a destination, the American landscape as a character, and the sense that the system is rigged against the guy trying to escape it. Cult classic with real poetry.

But It's strange and symbolic rather than straightforward, and the ending will frustrate anyone looking for a feel-good resolution.

Not sure tonight? Get a pick in a minute, starting from The Last American Hero

The wildcard

Something you would not have found on your own.

Harlan County U.S.A.1976

Same world, same people, same desperation. Where The Last American Hero shows one man's escape attempt, this shows the hundreds who can't escape at all. It's the other side of the same coin.

Barbara Kopple's documentary of a Kentucky coal-mining strike. Working-class men and women fighting for dignity against a system designed to keep them down. Furious, real, essential.

But It's a documentary, not a drama—no Hollywood resolution. The violence is real. It's also deeply political, and if you're uncomfortable with labor activism, it won't feel neutral.

Five Easy Pieces1970

Jack Nicholson as a man caught between worlds—his blue-collar past and an artistic present he can't quite own. The discomfort of not belonging anywhere is the whole point.

But It's a character drama about going nowhere, not a triumph narrative. Some scenes are unbearably tense in a way that feels uncomfortable rather than entertaining.

Slap Shot1977

Paul Newman in a sports film that's actually about masculine identity and economic collapse in a rust-belt town. Funny, profane, and heartbreaking in ways it doesn't announce.

But If you're not interested in hockey or in depressed, working-class communities, the setting might not pull you in.

Junior Bonner1972

Steve Reeves as a aging rodeo rider trying to stay relevant. Sam Peckinpah directed it, so there's real tenderness for men past their prime, alongside the dust and sweat.

But It's a quiet film about failure and aging. There's no redemption arc, just a man trying to hold on to what he was.

American Graffiti1973

Released the same year, set in the same era, it's about young men facing the moment when they have to grow up or commit to running. Nostalgic but not sentimental.

But If you've seen it a hundred times, you know it well. And it's lighter in tone—less interested in the cost of ambition than in the sting of farewell.

Hickey & Boggs1972

Robert Culp and Bill Cosby as two private investigators in Los Angeles, making a film about what happens when you're no longer young and useful. Overlooked and genuinely strange.

But It's a noir that doesn't quite cohere, with a rambling plot and long stretches where nothing happens. Not for patient viewers only—for patient viewers with tolerance for oddness.

Badlands1973

Terrence Malick's fever dream about two young fugitives. Beautiful, mythic, and interested in the romance and the delusion of running from your circumstances.

But It's expressionistic and philosophical rather than plot-driven. If you need realism and forward momentum, the dreamy style will feel pretentious.

GoodFellas1990

Both trace the seduction of a world and the way a man can't maintain a double life. Both are about the moment when you've committed too far to turn around, and both understand the appeal without judging the man for feeling it.

Scorsese's portrait of a man seduced by an identity—gangster instead of racer, but the same hunger to be somebody, the same discovery that you can't go back, the same price for entry.

But It's stylish and exhilarating, which can feel trivializing. If you're looking for moral clarity or a character who learns his lesson, this isn't it.