Sure, he’s handsome, but can he drive? You bet. His name is Sonny Hayes (Brad Pitt), and he can drop behind the wheel of a Formula One racecar, take it for a spin and tell you exactly what’s wrong with it. After he crashes it, that is. It only cost, what, $150,000? What’s 150 among friends?
Sonny’s old racing pal, Ruben (Javier Bardem), is hemorrhaging money to the tune of $350 million, and his team hasn’t won a race or even scored a point all season. If Ruben can’t turn it around, it’s the ax. That’s why he needs Sonny, a washed-up driver 30 years past his prime, to turn his team of misfit toys around.
If this were a mid-century French novel, Sonny would be an existential hero. We would know nothing of his backstory and his demons, nada of his hopes and dreams. His actions would explain his character, and we would ask for nothing more. But this isn’t a French existential novel; this is F1: The Movie — a Hollywood blockbuster from Warner Bros. engineered to make a boatload of money on the backs of stale formulas and the lowest common denominator.
Instead of a mysterious figure wandering out of the past to perfect the present, we know more than we want, including a dreadfully written scene where Sonny explains how it feels to go fast. I’m speculating here, but Pitt delivers this monologue with so little conviction he probably thought they would cut it out. No such luck, Brad.
Written by Ehren Kruger and directed by Joseph Kosinski, F1 isn’t a movie; it’s a product placement bonanza. If you’ve seen a race you know these drivers are covered head to toe with sponsors — as is Sonny and teammate Joshua Pearce (Damson Idris), so points for realism. But must they constantly stand in front of banners for Heineken 0.0, Crypto.com and all the other companies that ponied up for this globetrotting advert?
What did all that money buy? Clichés and little else. Kruger and Kosinski contrive Ruben’s outfit to be the li’l team that could with the pit crew haphazardly dropping their tools, the car’s designer, Kate (Kerry Condon), flummoxed by the “dirty air” in the turns and Pearce’s inability to become the driver everyone thinks he is. Enter Sonny and his bag of old-school tricks. Watch as he jogs around the track! Marvel as he juggles tennis balls and flicks playing cards into a hat!
Give me a break. Ruben’s facility is state-of-the-art, Kate is a former Lockheed Martin rocket scientist and Pearce is clearly a top 10 driver. Their only shortcoming is a formulaic screenplay. At one point, my seat neighbor left to replenish snacks for himself and his dad. He was gone for a solid 10 minutes and missed a significant plot point. But when he returned, he sat in rapt attention and gave no indication that he was confused where the story had gone in his absence. .
Sure, he missed one of the movie’s spectacular car crashes and Hans Zimmer’s oppressive score that demands you surrender or else. Then again, maybe he didn’t. Even if he had gone to get his popcorn during Sonny’s monologue, he wouldn’t have missed the words because the filmmakers make another character repeat them in the movie’s climax just in case. Be a shame if you couldn’t connect those dots on your own.
But what am I getting all huffy about? Did I really come to F1 expecting something other than this? No. (But wouldn’t it be nice?) Yes, the cinematography from Claudio Miranda is thrilling — especially the cameras mounted on the cars that whip around to show you Pitt and Idris are doing at least some of their own driving. Yes, Pitt is still charming even when he’s in full-blown paycheck mode. And yes, it looks great in IMAX. But why does it all have to feel so flat ?
ON SCREEN: F1: The Movie opens in theaters June 27.