ADVERTISEMENTStop me if you’ve seen this one before…
A talented, reckless loner who has seen better days gets coaxed out of retirement for one last ride. Along the way, he’ll butt heads with a cocky whippersnapper who still has plenty to learn. And wouldn’t you know it, the initial frostiness between the two hunky men melts into mutual respect, and the grouchy veteran ends up learning something too as he finally walks into the sunset, having become richer for the experience.
Yeah, that’s what we’re working with for this Apple Original, Lewis Hamilton-produced sports film which yearns to be an old-school, high-octane celebration of Formula One.
To be fair, in this respect, F1 – or should that be, F1® The Movie, for algorithmic purposes you understand – succeeds.
However, as a high stakes drama featuring three dimensional characters and a decent script that isn’t just an excuse for cramming in as much product placement as humanly possible and showing off quite to what extent Brad Pitt still looks like a Greek God aged 61, F1® The Movie is a broadly enjoyable but soulless blockbuster that passes the time providing you like your macho loners roguish and watching cars go vroom vroom vroooooom.
You really can’t fault them for trying. Following the success of Netflix’s hit documentary series Formula One: Drive To Survive, making a big budget ad with a sponsors-pleasing trademark symbol in the title seems like a sure-fire way to get bums on theatre seats. But when you have a reported $300 million budget to play with, the least anyone could have done was chuck a few quid in the direction of the writer’s room.
In F1® The Movie, we follow how veteran driver Sonny Hayes (Pitt) is tempted back by former teammate Ruben Cervantes (Javier Bardem, charming as ever) to get behind the wheel of an F1 car, as a last-ditch attempt to save his flagging APXGP team from being sold by the shareholders.
Along for the ride is Joshua Pearce (Damon Idris), a talented rookie in dire need of a mentor, and the team’s technical director, Kate McKenna (standout Kerry Condon), who is tasked with turning the “shitbox” car into a “combat” machine.
At least she’s an age-appropriate love interest, because we all know where this leads.
The team have nine races leading to the Abu Dhabi Grand Prix to turn it all around and show quite to what extent the world of Formula One is really terrific and not at all problematic sport like so many others, la la la we can’t hear you.
Director Joseph Kosinski, cinematographer Claudio Miranda and screenwriter Ehren Kruger, who previously collaborated on 2022’s Top Gun: Maverick, are all reunited here to… well, do much of the same. Except this time, it’s with Brad Pitt and not Tom Cruise.
To their credit, Kosinski and Miranda manage to shoot cars like they did planes, and make the racing scenes immersive. By using shooting on real circuits with the full co-operation of the organisers and using new, smaller IMAX cameras that sit on the cars, this will be the closest you’ll get to living the F1 experience. The Easter egg cameos from real F1 pilots like Max Verstappen and Hamilton also add an air of authenticity to the proceedings.
The weak link is Kruger, whose formulaic screenplay underserves the talent and resumes itself to: macho bravado is great, and lines like: “I’m just as bad as I used to be” and “Do we have the car?” / “We have THE DRIVER!”
Add the lazy exposition from voice-over commentators during the race (“This is not where he wants to be – last place” – oh, gee, thanks a bunch, scribe!) and there are genuinely moments when you want to wrap your lips around an exhaust pipe. But then again, this is the same Ehren Kruger who botched up Scream 3, gave us scripts for Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen, Dark of the Moon and Age of Extinction, as well as the much-maligned live-action remake of Ghost in the Shell… So let’s not act too surprised about the generic nature of this underdog sports drama.
For all the F1® The Movie bashing, this crowd-pleaser isn’t a bad time at the talkies. Provided you can look past the formulaic plot and the fact F1® The Movie is often half a movie and half a blatant PR exercise brimming with distracting product placement, it has its moments. Condon is great; the score by the ever-reliable Hans Zimmer is strong; some nice (if obvious) needle drops from classic rock legends Queen and Led Zeppelin sit well alongside chart-toppers RAYE, Tate McRae and Doja Cat; and again, the race scenes deliver the rubber-burning goods.
If only they’d spent a bit more time and money on avoiding clichés and crafting something that feels less like an expensive corporate promo… Then the pedal could have truly been put to the metal.
F1® The Movie is out in cinemas now.
