This film is a flashy, propulsive adrenaline-gushing entertainer that manages to keep you excited throughout its long, drawn-out runtime, but there’s nothing that stays with you after the movie runs its course
F1 review
Film: F1
Cast: Brad Pitt, Damson Idris, Kerry Condon, Javier Bardem, Kim Bodnia, Tobias Menzies, Shea Whigham, Sarah Niles
Director: Joseph Kosinski
Rating: * * *
Runtime: 156 min
Joseph Kosinski, the director of “Top Gun: Maverick,” takes “F1” into the speed zone - all revved up and ready to vroom-zoom into an adrenaline-gushing, excitement-spewing entertainer. The cars go fast and furious across the racetrack with fuel igniting high-voltage accidents and phoenix-like resurrections, all part of the same game. This professional auto-race drama is epic, moves at dizzying speed with vicarious thrills and zippy energy that is quite contagious.
Produced by Jerry Bruckheimer, the script by Ehren Kruger reconstitutes old tropes for a put-together story about Sonny(Brad Pitt), who was in the running for the Formula One championship before a shocking crash put an end to that dream. Now, over-the-hill, ageing but stunningly fit, with three marriages behind him and a gambling addiction that won’t quit, he hires himself out for races.
The opening sequence, accompanied by “Whole Lotta Love” on the soundtrack, has Sonny Hayes, a freelance Formula One has-been, getting set for night shift at the 24 Hours of Daytona race. It’s Sonny’s job to get his team out of the doldrums to a first-place finish. And he does it with style - zipping through the competition at breakneck speed.
His old racing buddy Ruben Cervantes (Javier Bardem), the owner of the APXGP Formula One team, which is down in the dumps, tracks Sonny down to Orlando, in order to enrol him to get the APXGP team out of the pits. Sonny, not being a team player, is rather reluctant, but the chance for redemption, to get a shot at his once-shattered dream after 30 years in the sidelines, is impossible for him to refuse. Once onboarded, he shows the APXGP folks how it’s done.
Josh Pearce (Damson Idris), the team’s hotshot British rookie and Sonny clash on the racetrack in an ego-centred rivalry that has high-octane moments before the two start working together as a team that can race off to a podium finish. Sonny, though an “old man” in racing circles and set in his ways, shows the young buck that it takes a special blend of daredevilry and discipline to make that winning finish.
To showcase Sonny’s Formula One crash sequence, the film uses documentary footage of Martin Donnelly’s Spanish Grand Prix 1990 crash as a stand-in. It’s woven in beautifully as to set the mood for his future phoenix-like rising from the ashes of a disaster that would have taken out most other competitors. The narrative tempo is dizzyingly fast, with futuristic cars helmed by speed junkies accelerating around the racetrack at regular intervals. It’s a thrilling high that gets ramped up by Hans Zimmer’s thumping score.
Kosinski relies on familiar formulas and cliches to tell this story. The movie is an out-of-body experience, has a lot of flash and dash, but there’s nothing much to ground you here. The storytelling is rather fragmented and doesn’t give a clear picture of the processes involved in achieving the season-long podium finish. The commentators do their best to give us details while the race is on, but it's not enough to get involved in the copiously manufactured atmospheric excitement. The action is largely confined to stadium racetracks. We don’t get an overview of the action while it's taking place, and the corporate drama in the background doesn’t cut much ice.
Damson Idris has charisma, Kerry Condon, as Kate McKenna, APXGP’s technical director, an obligatory love interest for Sonny, is competent and Pitt and Bardem shoulder the star load.
This film is a flashy, propulsive adrenaline gushing entertainer that manages to keep you excited throughout its long, drawn runtime but there’s nothing that stays with you after the movie runs its course.
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