Ever wondered what 'Top Gun' on wheels might be like?
'Top Gun: Maverick' director Joseph Kosinski answers that question with 'F1' - a blockbuster hit in cinemas last summer which has made this year's Best Picture Oscar shortlist.
Costing somewhere in the region of $200-300 million, it's a sleek, petrol fumed tale of Formula One drivers in an underdog team trying to make their mark in the sport.
At its core is Brad Pitt's Sonny Hayes, a former F1 prodigy in the autumn of his career, eking out a living at Daytona and other US race tracks.
Sonny is wooed back into Formula One racing 30 years after a career ending crash at the Spanish Grand Prix by Javier Bardem's friend and former Lotus teammate turned team owner, Ruben Cervantes.
Ruben wants Sonny to join his struggling APXGP team as the second driver to help Damson Idris' up and coming star Joshua Pearce win one Grand Prix race.
Failure to achieve that goal will result in APXGP's investors pulling out of the team, with Tobias Menzies' board member menacingly hanging around each race like a vulture.
The problem is Sonny is a bit of a maverick who likes to take chances on the track.
He also has a personality clash with Joshua who he regards as a bit of a show pony - behaving like a top F1 star but with no results to back it all up.
Sonny's unorthodox behaviour on the track also unnerves the team principal, Kim Bodnia's Kaspar Smolinski and Kerry Condon's technical director Kate McKenna who realises a lot of APXGP's troubles are just down to personality.
As Kate tries to get Joshua and Sonny to gel, she also grows close to the American driver.
But with someone within the team also undermining their chances, can Sonny, Joshua and APXGP still win a race against all odds?
As you would expect from the director of 'Top Gun: Maverick,' 'F1' is a technically superb, rollicking blockbuster that moves along at just the right pace as it charts the ups and downs of Ruben's team.
Some may quibble that the story is a bit too slight to be on the Academy Awards' Best Picture shortlist but it's certainly a slickly made, brash crowd pleaser that stakes a lot of its credibility on its authenticity.
Working from an Ehren Kruger screenplay, Kosinski uses real F1 venues like Silverstone, Monza, Zandvoort, Las Vegas, Brands Hatch and Suzuka for its thrilling race sequences.
Major names in the sport like Lewis Hamilton, Max Verstappen, Oscar Piastri, Nyck De Vries and Lando Norris appear as themselves, directly competing against Pitt and Idris' characters.
Sky Sports commentators Martin Brundle and David Croft lend their voices to the race scenes and there are cameos by CEOs of F1 teams, other motorsport presenters like Natalie Pinkham, Will Buston and Rachel Brookes, the Dutch DJ Tiësto and the social media influencers, Simon Minto and Sabrina Bahsoon.
Essentially a big showcase for the sport, it's a thrilling enough ride and never dull.
In the lead role, Pitt brings a muscular Steve McQueen like presence to the movie.
Condon, Bodnia, Bardem and Menzies are good value in the supporting roles - with the Irish actress bringing a Maureen O'Hara like feistiness to her part.
Idris delivers plenty of swagger, with Sansom Kayo providing comic relief as Joshua's cousin and manager and Sarah Niles solid as his mother, Bernadette.
Nominated for four Oscars including Film Editing and Visual Effects, Kosinski's film is fancied to win Best Sound and deservedly so.
But it could well take the chequered flag in those other two categories.
However with a box office take of over $633 million and still counting, 'F1' has already triumphed.
Taking home an Oscar or two will just be icing on a very rich cake.
('F1' was released in UK and Irish cinemas on June 25, 2025)
Comments
Post a Comment