F1: The Movie

by George Wolf

With Top Gun: Maverick, director Joseph Kosinski understood the assignment better than any director in recent years. Talent, swagger, airborne thrills and pinpoint vibe control made that film better than we could have imagined.

Now Kosinski brings a very similar blueprint to F1: The Movie, right down to that punctuation in the title.

Brad Pitt effortlessly assumes the role of a rogue mentor flying by his own rules, this time on the racetrack. Thirty years ago, Sonny Hayes (Pitt) had a promising career as a Grand Prix driver. A nasty crash derailed that, sending him to decades of minor league racing, professional gambling and even some cab driving.

But now, Sonny is the Hail Mary called by his old racing partner. Ruben Cervantes (Javier Bardem) is a desperate team owner with a cocky young driver named Joshua Pearce (Damson Idris) and a losing streak about to bring the whole thing down.

If Sonny’s “maverick” approach to driving can somehow get Ruben one win before the season ends, he can save the whole APX team.

Can Sonny be the Crash Davis to Joshua’s Nuke LaLoosh? Is he up for taking one more shot at glory and maybe some sexy time with APX tech director Kate McKenna (Kerry Condon)?

It doesn’t matter if you already know, just like it doesn’t matter that much of the dialog is cheesy, many reaction shots deliver sitcom-worthy mugging and the TV commentators narrate straight from “Racing for Dummies.”

Pitt, Bardem, Condon and Idris might as well be winking through it all. They’re clearly having a ball, and elevate material that – like Maverick -would have been insufferable in lesser hands. F1 may not have nostalgia in its cockpit, but the swagger and the vibe are too fun to resist, while Kosinski (also a co-writer this time) delivers the pinpoint control.

Filmed for IMAX, F1‘s racing sequences are as thrilling on the track as Top Gun is in the air. The camerawork and pacing, the editing and some rockin’ needle drops keep the adrenaline pumping, and even that two and a half hour run time doesn’t feel as bloated as it probably should.

F1: The Movie won’t keep you guessing. And it won’t challenge your brain. But that isn’t the mission of this race team. The goal here is (really) big screen entertainment, movie star glamour, plenty of speed-fueled visceral thrills and maybe even a fist pump or two.

Ground control to victory lane: get the champagne ready.