Insomnia File #75: 300 Miles For Stephanie (dir by Clyde Ware)

What’s an Insomnia File? You know how some times you just can’t get any sleep and, at about three in the morning, you’ll find yourself watching whatever you can find on cable or streaming? This feature is all about those insomnia-inspired discoveries!

If you were having trouble getting to sleep last night, you could have watched 1981’s 300 Miles For Stephanie.

Tony Orlando — yes, the singer — plays Alberto Rodriguez. When the movie begins, Alberto is a rambunctious military veteran who is notorious for drinking too much and getting into fights. After his latest arrest, he is ordered to turn his life around. With the help of his cousin (Edward James Olmos), he gets a job as a cop in San Antonio. Eventually, he gets married and he becomes a father to Stephanie.

When Stephanie is born, Alberto is told that his daughter probably won’t make it to her fifth birthday. The struggle of raising a handicapped daughter becomes too much for Alberto’s wife and soon, Alberto is a single father. When Stephanie makes it to her fifth birthday, Alberto rides a bicycle 300 miles to a chapel so he can give thanks to God. Later, after his story is picked up the San Antonio media, Alberto resolves to run to the chapel, covering 300 miles on foot in just five days.

300 Miles For Stephanie is clearly a made-for-TV movie from the early 80s. It’s the type of movie where every dramatic beat leads to the inevitable fade-out for commercials. The budget is low and there’s not a single subtle moment to be found in the film but the story itself is so touching that it doesn’t matter. Maybe it’s because it’s Holy Week. Maybe it’s because I’ve recently had to say goodbye to people that I loved. Maybe I’m just as sucker for these type of stories. It doesn’t matter. I cried.

As an actor, Tony Orlando was a little stiff but he still brought a likable earnestness to the role and he got good support from Edward James Olmos, Pepe Serna, Gregory Sierra, and Peter Graves. Graves’s role is small but, as Alberto’s captain, he’s exactly the type of fair-minded authority figure who we could use more of nowadays.

It’s a touching film. In real life, Stephanie, who no one expected to see her second birthday, lived to be 26 years old.

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