{"id":324471,"date":"2020-12-30T06:00:24","date_gmt":"2020-12-30T11:00:24","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/formnutrition.com\/us\/?p=324471"},"modified":"2021-11-29T07:50:04","modified_gmt":"2021-11-29T12:50:04","slug":"new-year-new-me-youre-going-to-need-a-montage-so-heres-ten-of-the-best","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/formnutrition.com\/us\/inform\/new-year-new-me-youre-going-to-need-a-montage-so-heres-ten-of-the-best\/","title":{"rendered":"New Year, New You? You’re Gonna Need a Montage (So Here’s Ten of the Best)"},"content":{"rendered":"

\u201cShow a lot of things happening at once \/ Remind everyone of what\u2019s going on \/ And with every shot show a little improvement \/ To show it all would take too long.\u201d<\/span><\/em><\/p>\n

The song “Montage\u201d from 2004\u2019s\u00a0<\/span>Team America: World Police<\/span><\/em>\u00a0neatly explains the editing technique of quick cuts between shots. And through puppets pumping iron<\/a> to cheesy rock,\u00a0<\/span>Team America<\/span><\/em>\u00a0hilariously illustrates how using montages to fast-track training in films has become a ripe clich\u00e9: \u201cEven Rocky had a montage.\u201d More like six.<\/span><\/p>\n

The first, 1976\u2019s<\/span>\u00a0Rocky<\/span><\/em>, is often wrongly credited as the first training montage ever, although it\u2019s \u201ccertainly one of the most memorable and enjoyable\u201d to Dr. Lindsay Steenberg<\/a>, a senior lecturer in film studies at Oxford Brookes University. But training montages have been around at least as long as Hollywood has been knocking out boxing films: 1931\u2019s\u00a0<\/span>The Champ<\/span><\/em>\u00a0is a favourite early film of Steenberg. War films, with their ragtag bands of misfits moulded into tight units, also contain some \u201ctreasures\u201d.<\/span><\/p>\n

Training montages found currency in the 1980s and the era of MTV when films increasingly featured pop songs. Music is a key ingredient in the secret sauce of the training montage, demarcating it as a special moment – particularly if the music is pop, not score. \u201cInsulated units\u201d of cinema that revolve around spectacle, training montages naturally lend themselves to online distribution as clips, says Steenberg, while their music finds its way onto our workout playlists. They\u2019re \u201cperfect pop culture trading cards\u201d.<\/span><\/p>\n

Part of the appeal of training montages is that we\u2019ve seen the payoff. \u201cWe know the montage works and we can find inspiration by mirroring it in our own training,\u201d says Steenberg, whose own workout playlist includes \u201cYou\u2019re The Best\u201d by Joe Esposito from the tournament montage in 1984\u2019s\u00a0<\/span>The Karate Kid<\/span><\/em>. (\u201cWax on, wax off\u201d isn\u2019t a montage, sorry.)<\/span><\/p>\n

\"karate<\/p>\n

Training montages work on a number of levels. In her book\u00a0<\/span>The Joy Of Movement<\/span><\/em>, Dr Kelly McGonigal<\/a>, a research psychologist, and lecturer at Stanford University (as well as a group fitness instructor) explains how watching movement triggers \u201ca sympathetic response\u201d: your heart rate rises, and your premotor cortex fires. You sense the actions in your own body, which makes the experience not just visual but visceral.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

Rooted in our mirror neuron system, this \u201cembodied empathy\u201d is an instinctive attempt to understand others and \u201csurely part of the thrill of watching sports, dance or stunts\u201d. As well as giving us pleasure, it also broadens \u201cour own sense of what\u2019s possible for ourselves\u201d. Hashtag fitspo, as the ‘grammers would say.<\/span><\/p>\n

Following American investment in \u201cmyths of individualism and meritocracy\u201d, the main lesson from training montages, says Steenberg, is that \u201cwe have the power to make ourselves\u201d, which \u201ctakes work and must be earned\u201d. But hard-bodied self-determination can develop a heart-hearted lack of sympathy for others who are perceived as too lazy to do likewise, rather than disadvantaged.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

Some scholars see training montages as a manifestation of \u201cbio-power\u201d, a celebration of the able, white, male body that casts a shadow over other and, the suggestion is, lesser bodies. But then these Nietzchean, if not tights-wearing, supermen are often perfectly sculpting themselves to fight tyranny and totalitarianism – conflicts Steenberg finds \u201cinfinitely fascinating\u201d. It\u2019s complicated.<\/span><\/p>\n

Viewing Eighties action films in their cultural context of Cold War politics post-Vietnam and a backlash of ‘hard’ masculinity against feminism, Steenberg shows her students the training montage from 1985\u2019s\u00a0<\/span>Rocky IV<\/span><\/em>\u00a0– but not as a cautionary tale. <\/span><\/p>\n

Instead, she encourages them to think about what makes the \u201cglorious and glittering cinematic jewels\u201d that are training montages such a joy to watch, re-watch, share, and compile into top-ten lists. And she won\u2019t deny jogging up the same steps in Philadelphia as Rocky \u201cin reverent homage\u201d. Training montages have the undeniable power to move us.<\/span><\/p>\n

10 Of The Best Training Montages<\/h2>\n

Rocky (1976)<\/span><\/h3>\n

The\u00a0<\/span><\/em>iconic training montage and song: the opening trumpets of composer Bill Conti\u2019s Academy Award-nominated \u201cGonna Fly Now\u201d provoke a practically Pavlovian response to pull on grey sweats, go for a run, and punch meat. <\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cPower songs\u201d that change our mood and physiology have strong \u201cextramusical associations,\u201d writes McGonigal: they trigger \u201cpositive emotions, images and meaning\u201d based on personal memories, pop culture (if a song was the soundtrack to a film, for example), the performers or the lyrics. But \u201cthe most important\u201d for pushing you are the words. \u201cGonna Fly Now\u201d is, like Rocky, hard to beat.<\/span><\/p>\n

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