‘All my life I’ve had people pointing at me. Nobody makes fun of me now’

blades, whereas before ‘using a leg was too hard to walk, too embarrassing.

‘I never intended to go to Rio, but when it came I thought, “Why not?” Seeing how people accepted me in the airport [after Rio]. Mentally, that helped me a lot.

‘When I was bullied as a child, I figured to myself, “These are not bullies, they are just people who want to know more.” Emotionally, that was a big step I took when I was young. Sometimes I do a reality check and I see how sad it is [culturally] still for people with disabilities, but the only ones who can fix it are the people like me who have been there.

Matt Stutzman, now 37, from Iowa, won a silver medal in archery at the London 2012 Paralympics for the USA, and was the only Paralympian archer to hold the bow with his feet. Born with no arms and given up for adoption, he was taken in at 13 months ‘ by an amazing family who had put on their paperwork that they wanted a child with a mental or physical disability’.

Stutzman had just learnt to walk in the facility where he lived. ‘The adoption agency said to my parents, “There is this one child?” I stood up and tried to run to them. It was like it was meant to be.’

His adoptive parents brought him up to be entirely self-sufficient, allowing him to discard the arms he was briefly fitted with, but refusing to do things for him. ‘They saw the bigger picture. It all taught me to be who I am today. In the early years they had to be tougher with me, but I would not be having this conversation now if they hadn’t.’

He only began shooting a bow with his feet in his mid-20s, because following the 2007 recession, he was unable to find a job.

Not only was the US economy in bad shape, but prospective employers were simply not prepared to even countenance employing a man with no arms, saying, ‘You have no arms! No way! You can’t do this or that,’ even though he had learnt to live ‘normally’ for years, using his feet for everything from shaving to holding cutlery.

Now he drives and brings up three children between the ages of eight and 14 as a sole parent, and yet nothing about his home – or his bow – has been adapted. ‘I simply began to use a bow out of necessity. I knew that if I could teach myself how to shoot a deer, I could get 150lb of meat with which to feed my children. It was either that or no food.’

He was so good at shooting that he began participating in tournaments, earning enough from prize winnings to look after his family, and the very community that shunned him as a prospective employee now honours him.

The prejudice – what the film’s directors say contributes to the journey from minus to zero before a Paralympian can even begin to climb from zero to 100 – has helped Stutzman in a way. ‘All my life I’ve had to deal with people pointing at me, saying stuff, and from a young age, I could shut it all off, I could just “do me”. So at London 2012, I could block it all out. I don’t remember the cameras, the people, none of it. In big situations, it’s where I’m at my best. Nobody makes fun of me now. Everybody wants to come over and hang out.’

The cancellation of Tokyo came as a blow. ‘I felt ready,’ he says, ‘and for a bit I was definitely disappointed, but I want to do my best and win gold and this basically gives me a whole extra year.’

Such positivity is a trope for all the Paralympians, whose mantra is move forward, keep positive, don’t dwell or despair. ‘I tend not to think too much about the dark days,’ says Peacock. ‘I take everything as it comes, take it, deal with it, you can’t sit there and think… I would have got to the start line at Tokyo, but a delay is less of a risk for me.’

It’s hard to imagine the little boy Peacock was after his amputation. Eight months later, with his school’s sports day approaching, his mother asked if he could at least take part in the hopping race. He smashed it.

With a gold in 2012, and another in 2016, next year’s gold will be in his sights too.

‘I hope I’ve grown, but still stayed true to myself,’ he says. ‘Sport has taught me so much. It’s taken me for a ride. You can’t unlearn those lessons.’

‘I think it’s a blessing in disguise,’ says Bonhôte of the postponement of Tokyo 2020, ‘because the film won’t be clashing with the event itself. And hopefully it will make people tune into the Paralympic Games next year.’

‘I think it’s lovely that the film is still going to come out at the end of August,’ echoes Ettedgui. ‘Hopefully during what will be the tail end of Covid, because the film can be a different kind of flame.’

Rising Phoenix is on Netflix from 26 August