F1: Film - is it worth going to the cinema? It's a racing masterpiece, but we have a few "BUTs"
I first heard about the planned production in the second half of the 2023 season, when during one of the races, the commentators enigmatically mentioned Brad Pitt and a film crew hanging around the paddock. I thought that another star wanted to rub shoulders with the sports world. Nothing could be further from the truth! These were the first shots for a serious production , and a fictional production at that, not a documentary.
The film is directed by Joseph Kosinski, who recently created "Top Gun: Maverick" - an impressive film with a good plot, for Hollywood. Now it's time to film the "jet planes" on four wheels - Formula 1 cars. The film has received the official blessing of the FIA and is to be a showcase for the queen of motorsport, which will popularize the discipline and attract new fans.
F1: Film - what is fact and what is fiction?The story told in the film is interestingly interwoven with the real history of Formula 1. Namely, in 1990 during the Spanish Grand Prix weekend there was a dramatic accident involving Martin Donnelly, whose Lotus fell to pieces after hitting the barriers. The impact ripped off the seat with the driver strapped in, and the sight of the Briton lying on the track is still chilling.
The film's producers reached an agreement with the hero of those unfortunate events and adapted this story as a starting point for the story of Sonny Heyes. As with the original, the accident meant the end of Pitt's Formula 1 career. There are more similarities: both recovered and were hired drivers in various racing series. The fictional driver experienced various twists and turns in life and after better and worse episodes behind the wheel (including in a New York taxi), at the urging of his former teammate, decided to return to the controls of an F1 car.
F1: Film / Press Materials / Apple / Warner Bros PolskaAPXGP is a tail-end stable and is under threat of a hostile takeover by a villain from the backroom of racing. The only hope is a sixty-year-old American macho nomad living in a van. And here I have some reservations about the story told in the film.
Some of the script's paths are predictable, and the driver-messiah figure is overly strong. To such an extent that even the team director is so impressed by Sonny Heyes' strength of character that he nods with open-mouthed amazement several times...
Another glaring omission concerns the FIA regulations , for example obtaining a mandatory super license in Formula 1. There is not a word about it here, and you might think that this is a feature film and there is no time for such boredom as driving at least 300 km during official tests , etc., etc. After the crashes, there is not a word about penalty points, and some of them should have ended with a black flag for Sonny, who acted deliberately.
F1: Film / Press Materials / Apple / Warner Bros PolskaThe good thing about this story is how the APXGP team got there. It wasn’t thanks to an extra secret gear or a “Fast and Furious” style nitro hidden under the seat.
This is due to the strategy that can be played out in the real world of F1. Another positive example is the internal rivalry between the drivers – young Damson Idris and Brad Pitt. The former is a sports technocrat, the latter an analog racing animal.
The first jogs on a treadmill covered in sensors, the second jogs around a racetrack in falling apart sneakers.
The first is arrogant and rebellious, the second calm and wise. In the end, one of them becomes the sail, and the other the wind… Fortunately, both are people of flesh and blood. They are athletes who sometimes lose their nerve and make mistakes.
Real Formula 1 vs. diplomacyThe producers did a fantastic job of hyper-realistically embedding the film in the real world of Formula 1. In shots from the paddock, the starting straight and press conferences, the characters from the story blend naturally with real drivers and team directors. Sometimes someone pats someone on the back, sometimes someone shows someone the middle finger… The dilemma that the creators have been struggling with from the very beginning is the diplomacy with which the real Formula 1 environment should be treated.
No one was to be shown in a bad light – neither drivers nor teams. It worked well, perhaps a little too neutrally. The only strong interaction between the two sides of the mirror was Lewis Hamilton’s spine-chilling glance at Damson Idris during the red flag. But then again, the seven-time world champion could afford to do that, he was one of the producers of the film, after all.
F1: Film / Press Materials / Apple / Warner Bros PolskaThe film's strongest point is the spectacular racing footage: from the view of the starting lights (in silence), which builds real tension, to rotating shots from surprising places on the car during madly taken corners.
Special ultralight cameras were constructed for filming, the position of which could be controlled remotely. The only visual thing that struck me as odd were the unnaturally large cars in the background in the shots from the nose of the race car.
The frame is filmed from a very wide angle, which should reduce the background, but the generated competition cars are unnaturally large.
I had the impression that if they were parked next to each other, the Haas car, for example, would be one and a half times bigger.
This does not change the fact that the whole thing is dynamic, sometimes disturbing and very exciting. If only it were accompanied by a spectacular symphony coming from the engine area... But that is the problem of the entire Formula 1. The cinema production has the advantage that the bland exhausts are drowned out by the very good music of Hans Zimmer.
F1: Film / Press Materials / Apple / Warner Bros Polska"The F1 Movie" is a good movie, sometimes stunning with its visual solutions and dynamics, but sometimes disappointing with trivial stories and funny shots, for example the slow-motion approach of Brad the savior...
Will the film become a classic of the genre or just a seasonal flare? I fear that the story will quickly evaporate from the minds of Formula One fans, and the only memory will be the memory of formal procedures.
