F1: The Movie – a fun but formulaic 'corporate tie-in'
Brad Pitt stars as a washed up racing driver returning three decades after a near-fatal crash
You can't fault the logic behind "F1", said Clarisse Loughrey in The Independent. Strapping an ageing A-lister into a fighter jet for "Top Gun: Maverick" translated into megabucks at the box office, so why not hire the team behind that film, including director Joseph Kosinski, and get them to pull off another summer blockbuster, this time involving fast cars.
'Bone-dry'
Alas, anyone expecting the same kind of thrills will be disappointed: "F1" offers "the spiritually bone-dry, abrasive inverse to all" of that earlier film's "giddy pleasures". In place of Tom Cruise's Maverick, our hero is Brad Pitt's Sonny, a former 1990s champion who is all washed up – until his former F1 comrade Ruben (Javier Bardem) gets in touch, and begs him to come to the aid of the failing team he now manages.
'Puppyishly charming'
You can guess what follows, said Robbie Collin in The Daily Telegraph. Sonny's "unorthodox" strategies pay dividends, and the team moves up "from the back of the grid at Silverstone to jockeying for pole position at Abu Dhabi's Yas Marina". So the film is certainly formulaic, but Pitt is "puppyishly charming", even if he does not achieve Cruise levels of magnetism; Britain's Damson Idris provides good support as an "impulsive" rookie; and though "F1" suffers for being a "corporate tie-in", it's well made and offers plenty of thrills, even for those who are not F1 fans.
The Week
Escape your echo chamber. Get the facts behind the news, plus analysis from multiple perspectives.
Sign up for The Week's Free Newsletters
From our morning news briefing to a weekly Good News Newsletter, get the best of The Week delivered directly to your inbox.
From our morning news briefing to a weekly Good News Newsletter, get the best of The Week delivered directly to your inbox.
Yes, it is terrifically shot and edited, said Nicholas Barber on BBC Culture. But the story makes little sense – our hero is so relaxed, cocky and brilliant, you wonder why his career was ever on the skids; and the film's attitude to F1 is so "fawning", it has the feel of a glossy promotional video. Indeed, it is so intent on being positive about Formula 1 and its milieu, there isn't even a "proper antagonist".
A free daily email with the biggest news stories of the day – and the best features from TheWeek.com
-
5 seriously spooky cartoons about HalloweenCartoons Artists take on the GOP boogeyman, a white sheet, and more
-
Political cartoons for October 25Cartoons Saturday’s political cartoons include hospital bill trauma, Independence Day, and more
-
Roasted squash and apple soup recipeThe Week Recommends Autumnal soup is full of warming and hearty flavours
-
Roasted squash and apple soup recipeThe Week Recommends Autumnal soup is full of warming and hearty flavours
-
6 well-crafted log homesFeature Featuring a floor-to-ceiling rock fireplace in Montana and a Tulikivi stove in New York
-
Film reviews: A House of Dynamite, After the Hunt, and It Was Just an AccidentFeature A nuclear missile bears down on a U.S. city, a sexual misconduct allegation rocks an elite university campus, and a victim of government terror pursues vengeance
-
Book reviews: ‘Gertrude Stein: An Afterlife’ and ‘Make Me Commissioner: I Know What’s Wrong With Baseball and How to Fix It’Feature Gertrude Stein’s untold story and Jane Leavy’s playbook on how to save baseball
-
Rachel Ruysch: Nature Into ArtFeature Museum of Fine Arts, Boston, through Dec. 7
-
Music reviews: Olivia Dean, Madi Diaz, and Hannah FrancesFeature “The Art of Loving,” “Fatal Optimist,” and “Nested in Tangles”
-
Gilbert King’s 6 favorite books about the search for justiceFeature The journalist recommends works by Bryan Stevenson, David Grann, and more
-
Ready for the apocalypseFeature As anxiety rises about the state of the world, the ranks of preppers are growing—and changing.