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Pumping Iron depicts two major competitions: Mr. Universe, which is for amateur participants, and Mr. Olympia, which is for professionals. Bodybuilding and a celebrity-to-be go mainstream.
The most fascinating aspect of this film is the dedicated training that turns average-built young men (frequently they refer to themselves as weaklings in their early youth) into superbly-created physical edifices.
An interesting, rather slick and excessively long documentary about the small but intensely competitive world of body-building.
May 09, 2005
Hollywood Reporter
Its in-your-face images of the bodybuilding subculture's well-oiled narcissism both startled and fascinated viewers, making for an unlikely boxoffice hit.
January 06, 2004
TV Guide
Directors George Butler and Robert Fiore never allow their film to turn into a freak show, but neither do they illuminate the appeal of body building, either to those who participate or those who watch.
The stage show is all about oiled hardbodies and sculpted musculature, but the movie is a portrait of competition as war and Schwarzenegger as the warrior supreme...
A very good film, beautifully shot and edited, intelligently structured and -- to risk what will surely seem at first a highly inappropriate term -- charming.