F1 (Theaters)
High-Octane Style, Low-Impact Storytelling
What’s it about? A Formula One driver comes out of retirement to mentor and team up with a younger driver.
Who it’s for? F1 enthusiasts, Brad Pitt lovers, if you like BIG and loud blockbusters, fans of Top Gun: Maverick, gearheads, fans of sports movies
Who should avoid? F1 purists, if you dislike cliché-laden narratives, if you like tension and dramatic stakes, if you’re not a fan of Brad Pitt
Watch if you like: Top Gun: Maverick, Drive to Survive, Senna, Rush, Ford v Ferrari, Days of Thunder
News and Notes:
Released today
Schmear’s Verdict: Sleek and corporate to a fault, F1 plays it safe but still delivers enough style, access, and adrenaline to make the ride worthwhile.
F1 is a movie as sleek and frictionless as their aerodynamic vehicles whizzing past at 200 MPH. Director Joe Kosinski takes the sturdy structure of Top Gun: Maverick—with its old vs. new school clichés, familiar beats, and roaring engines—and grafts it onto the ascendant sport of Formula One, swapping wizened Tom Cruise for craggy Brad Pitt mostly seamlessly.
But Top Gun: Maverick leaned on, brilliantly, the gestalt of Tony Scott’s 1986 classic—the score, the Val Kilmer of it, golden-hued and earnest. F1 gleams, yet even at 156 minutes (which, to me at least, flew by), it has difficulty conjuring the same soulfulness, even as the action sequences thrill and the sense of immersion into Formula One astounds.
Brad Pitt plays Sunny Hayes, a shiftless, nomadic racer who’s approached by Javier Bardem (The Counselor reunion!) in warm, comedic mode to join his struggling Formula One team, APXGP. Though the realism and authenticity of Formula One are immense, the plot is ludicrous but not hard to get into with the snappy pace, editing, and shiny cinematography from Claudio Miranda.
On the team is hotshot rookie JP (Damson Idris), who immediately, inevitably butts heads with Hayes. Also aiding APXGP is its head engineer, Kate, an amazing Kerry Condon, who quickly becomes the flirtation target of Hayes. Pitt and Condon have instantaneously crackling chemistry, though Pitt conjures that quite quickly with effectively everyone, thanks to his easygoing demeanor and insouciant smile.
But you’re not really here for the plot, right? You’re here for the glory of Formula One, which is displayed in full. The film was embedded in the sport for two seasons, working in extremely close proximity and counting the sport’s GOAT, Lewis Hamilton, as a key executive producer. This access is capitalized on, and the montages of the globetrotting Grand Prix, car testing, training, and racing—usually underscored by either Hans Zimmer or a brand new pop song—have little trouble revving audiences’ engines.
The trafficking in cliché is not necessarily a bad thing. You could poll a third-grader about what they think will happen plot-wise, and they’re likely to predict every beat correctly. This is satisfying, but the film’s lack of roughness, pathos, or genuine conflict made it feel uninteresting to me—as if this Apple/Formula One advertisement had been focus-grouped to death, with any idiosyncrasy sanded off, just like the $20M vehicles being driven.
This maybe applies most to its star, Brad Pitt. This is a carefully managed rehabilitation project for one of the coolest, chillest stars whose reputation has been dinged in recent years due to his alleged actions. Only one scene really hints at a frisson of truth, a late-night moment of reflection on a Vegas balcony, echoing that haunting final Babylon scene with Jean Smart, where the character and the man converge, and you wonder if his speech is about the twilighting of Sunny Hayes or of Pitt himself.
Unfortunately, little time is provided to properly stew in this meditation, as the plot zips forward toward the checkered flag. I know this is massive corporate entertainment. I’m not asking for the full Darren Aronofsky The Wrestler version of F1, though that’d be compelling. Nor am I requiring a Robert Towne script a la Days of Thunder, though I’d welcome it. Devoid of either, F1—especially its screenplay (from Ehren Kruger)—is entirely smooth, yet utterly sauceless.
In the final act, a movie that has so far been rather composed gets really sloppy, as a late-breaking, fully predictable villain enters in an absurdly shoehorned way. Characters make decisions that betray their nature for the sake of plot advancement leading up to “the big race.”
That final scene is breathtaking, induces sweaty palms, yet exemplifies the only really pure and “good” racing seen to date. I was overcome with euphoria for sure but felt as much transcendence in the first 30 minutes of the masterful Ayrton Senna documentary (and much more poignancy there too—it’s on Netflix, and I can’t recommend it enough).
All told, F1 succeeded in its aim. I went home electrified (mindfully driving cautiously, avoiding the impulse to burn serious rubber), and deep-dived into Formula One for hours, watching videos, reading articles, and watching Senna. A neophyte was being converted into a believer—or, more to F1’s goal, a consumer.
As an advertisement, the film undoubtedly, forcefully converted a new customer. As a movie, it left this film lover desiring more.
