F1® The Movie
Review by Mark Woodring
Racing movies are inherently exciting, as the visceral thrill of courting death as 200 MPH cannot be ignored. But the film can’t just be racing; there must be something more there, like there is in films such as Ford v Ferrari and Rush (a film I will admit took me a while to catch on to, but when it did… ).
How does Brad Pitt’s F1® The Movie (yes, we’ve been told that we have to refer to the film exactly like that…) stack up against those kinds of films?
**NOTE: You can read Mark’s review below, then listen or watch as he and Ryan discuss the film in more depth. Remember, though, you can listen to all our discussions of this and every other movie directly over on ACAST. Stay tuned.**
155 Minutes, Rated PG-13
Written by Joseph Kosinski, Ehron Kruger
Directed by Joseph Kosinski
Synopsis:
Dubbed “the greatest that never was,” Sonny Hayes was FORMULA 1’s most promising phenom of the 1990s until an accident on the track nearly ended his career. Thirty years later, he’s a nomadic racer-for-hire when he’s approached by his former teammate Ruben Cervantes, owner of a struggling FORMULA 1 team that is on the verge of collapse. Ruben convinces Sonny to come back to FORMULA 1 for one last shot at saving the team and being the best in the world. He’ll drive alongside Joshua Pearce, the team’s hotshot rookie intent on setting his own pace. But as the engines roar, Sonny’s past catches up with him and he finds that in FORMULA 1, your teammate is your fiercest competition—and the road to redemption is not something you can travel alone.
A fictional tale that draws on some of the best racing tropes (disappointing yet talented driver, struggling team, driver loyalty, the politics of racing… you get the idea), Pitt is the driven yet unreadable Sonny Hayes, a man so intent on driving he can’t see what’s around him: a team of people also trying to win.
F1 racing is a different beast than the kind of racing we saw in Ford v Ferrari, with Ken Miles seeming to single-handedly engineer and drive a car to glory from a dirty/greasy/unkempt garage with a rag-tag assemblage of support; F1 is an expansive cast, a ballet of experts and sterile numbers, all intent on mathing their way to victory.
Sonny Hayes is a big oil stain on that sterile, passionless world, and he does his damnedest to make them see that numbers aren’t everything; sometimes, doing the “wrong” thing in terms of their slavish devotion to an algorithmic blueprint of how to run a race, is exactly what is needed to to be right.
“Sometimes, when you lose, you win,” as we are reminded by Bardem’s Ruben during the film’s climactic race.
F1® The Movie also features the classic mentor-mentee relationship between Sonny and Joshua, the talented rookie training on simulators but without Sonny’s lifelong accumulation of practical wisdom about circling the track.
Kerry Condon is the first female design head in F1, struggling to prove she belongs as she fine-tunes the teams cars, until Sonny shows her what see’s not considering as she does so: racing is combat, not dance.
During the film, we get to see the way technology has separated the driver from the car over the years, with every aspect of the vehicle under constant electronic scrutiny by a battery of sensors intended to sniff out any deviant aspect of the master plan. Sonny is, well, old school.
The cinematography of F1® The Movie is wonderful, with the race edits frenetic yet purposeful. The musical choices (not the score… we’ll get to that) are beautifully placed, driving scenes and themes forward.
Hans Zimmer’s score is simply compelling. It’s not overpowering, but acts as a musical pit-crew for the film, cheering when it needs to and jumping out front to keep the film moving at its necessary pace when called upon.
My one minor complaint (or note) is that, in an attempt to immerse us in the roar of the cars and the racing atmosphere, the dialogue during those scenes is often a bit muddy, which leads to a loss of the strategic nuance which plays such a powerful role in the narrative. It’s not a deal-breaker by any stretch, but it was noticeable to me, even in IMAX®.
I absolutely loved F1® The Movie (even if the ending is a bit more sugary than I’d prefer) because there are countless Sonny Hayes’ in all sports, those who could have been, should have been, and who can’t let go of it, because they might still be.
F1® The Movie races into U.S. theaters June 27th and stars Brad Pitt, Damson Idris, Kerry Condon, Tobias Menzies, Kim Bodnia, and Javier Bardem.
And remember, if the BEST thing you can say about a movie is that it’s “visually stunning,” then they’ve done something wrong.
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