Cert – 12, Run-time – 2 hours 36 minutes, Director – Joseph Kosinski
To stop himself from being ousted from the Formula One team he’s recently bought, Ruben (Javier Bardem) recruits former teammate and thrill-seeking driver Sonny (Brad Pitt) to help put some points on the board.
From both a writing and directing perspective Joseph Kosinski seems to be aware that the thrills and focus are held in the action of the racing sequences. The screenplay for his follow-up to 2022’s smash-hit Top Gun: Maverick, co-written with Ehren Kruger, follows a conventional story that we’ve seen plenty of times before. An old-hand maverick, Brad Pitt’s Sonny Hayes, is called in by former racing teammate Ruben (Javier Bardem) when the Formula One team he’s purchased is consistently failing to earn any points in races. Needing to get some top ten placements, or else be ousted by the board of directors, he calls on his old friend who spends his time travelling across America in a van going from race to race. However, Sonny’s presence creates clashes with the APX GP team, especially young driver Joshua Pearce (Damson Idris) – trying to not fall just as he’s starting to run in the sport.
There’s an element of the film that feels as if it perhaps wouldn’t work if it didn’t have a film star in the lead role. Pitt, as one of the last remaining, carries a number of scenes with that movie star energy, and slight swagger, and appears to acknowledge that much of the focus is on the races. While establishing themselves in the early stages once past the first two or so things properly kick into gear and speed up. Trading planes for lightning-speed cars Kosinski manages to get across the thrill of the race by putting you less into the vehicle and more onto it; without feeling gimmicky.
While I may have no clue about what any of the conversation about different tyres meant or various technical aspects, generally the idea of needing the best car, and having to give notice of specifications, etc before races is mentioned and enough to go on. In fact, what eventually ends up explaining the obvious is the overlaid TV commentary which appears more frequently in the final stages, eventually just being there to explain what we’ve just seen. There are instances of this every now and then in occasional moments of dialogue, largely just pointing out basic dramatic beats which we’ve seen before.
Occasionally these more basic moments that try to move the narrative along can hold the film back somewhat due to just how stuck in convention they are, but it all acts as build-up to the next extended race sequence. And there’s a sense of suspense to these sequences the more we see of them, making for a particularly thrilling finale which has fun with both its style and the familiar elements which have more of a wink to them as they unfold in brief bursts so we can cut back to the car footage which is made to be seen on the big screen.
Footage which certainly doesn’t feel like watching cars drive round and round in circles for 2-and-a-half-hours. In part down to just how the camera is used to capture the speed and feel of the battle for a placement that will earn the team points on the championship board. The speed of these sequences matches that of those reached by the cars in the races, meaning that the run-time certainly isn’t felt, especially with how these instances take up most of the run-time over the slower, dialogue-based scenes. And Kosinski and co appear to know that these are the main selling point and focus of the film, putting the most push and effort into them and making a narrative so conventional it surely couldn’t distract.
F1’s narrative is seemingly intentionally very conventional, the effort has clearly been put into the fast-paced thrills and tension of the cinematic racing sequences which place you both in and on the cars in what turns out to be something of a traditional movie star vehicle for Brad Pitt.
Just A Little Bit Random 