The team behind Top Gun: Maverick shift from the skies to the tarmac for Formula 1 Racing
Joseph Kosinski (Top Gun: Maverick) takes his high-octane sensibilities from the skies to the tarmac in F1, a full-throttle dive into the sleek, high-stakes, and occasionally hollow world of the fastest sport on four-wheels, Formula 1 racing.
Sonny Hayes (Brad Pitt), a breakout F1 prospect in his youth, denied by a near-fatal crash. Despondent, he threw himself into the lower racing circuits, eking out a living as well as picking up some gambling debts and a number of marriages (and subsequent divorces) along the way. When old teammate Ruben (Javier Bardem, clearly having a ball) taps him to join his struggling F1 team, Sonny is thrust back into the limelight, partnered with talented but rookie driver Joshua Pearce (Damson Idris balancing youthful swagger with self-doubt). The situation is dire, with a underperforming car and a team that hasn’t been close to a win in 3 years. A hail Mary from Ruben, on an old-school driver whose aggression on the track is only matched by his unorthodox tactics. A desperate move to shake up the competition as well as his team.
The setup leans hard into genre tropes, grizzled veteran, cocky youngster, long odds, and a sport that’s more about team strategy than one-man heroism. There’s friction between the drivers, greasy politics from board member Banning (Tobias Menzies, oozing old-school slime), and some well-pitched tension from team strategist played by Kerry Condon, bringing warmth and wit to the film, as well as a credible foil to Pitt’s lead.
Clichés aside, F1 is undeniably thrilling when it counts. Kosinski and editor Stephen Mirrione do exhilarating work with the race sequences. Blisteringly fast, technically precise, and grounded in physical stakes. We hurtle across global circuits with immersive on-screen telemetry, expert commentary, and both car mounted-cameras and cockpit views convey the power and precision of F1. Close calls are frequent, pit-changes leave you breathless, sound design is penetrating and percussive, and thunderous rock music punctuates the roar of engines, lending the whole thing an almost gladiatorial edge.
There’s also an awareness of the perverse spectacle that surrounds F1. The film nods, sometimes too enthusiastically, to its own corporate entanglements. Product placement, luxury branding, and a Dubai-set climax that practically bathes in the sport’s tawdrier, more ostentatious side. This might read as indulgent if not for the fact that it’s true to the sport itself (and not just necessary to beef up the film’s budget). F1 may be slick and a little too promotional at times, but then again, so is Formula 1.
As Hayes, Pitt channels a kind of Paul Newman cool with shades of Cliff Booth, cocky, charming, arrogant, and just abrasive enough to make his eventual arc feel earned. His flaws are telegraphed early but mostly kept to surface-level quirks until plot demands kick in. He’s not reinventing the wheel here, but his charisma fills the gaps left by a script (from Kosinski and Ehren Kruger) that sometimes coasts on exposition. It makes sense when delivered by TV pundits for the benefit of less F1-savvy audiences, especially in the U.S., but feels off when seasoned pit engineers explain basic strategies to one another. Character development is also a rather pedestrian element, with Pitt’s many pairings including an old friendship, a romance, a sparring with a wheeling and dealing board member, and of course the core mentor/mentee relationship. It all feels a little under-baked and underwhelming, feeding a clamor to get back on the racetrack. Paring this down and focusing on the more crucial team relationship would not just add focus, it would help the film cut down on its rather heft runtime too.
The action pieces are intense, the stakes are high, but the outcome is never really in doubt. But that’s part of the deal. F1 knows the underdog formula inside and out. The setbacks, the breakthroughs, the moment everything clicks and while its emotional stakes may be as manufactured as its race cars and their investors, there’s enough velocity and verve to make the ride worth it, especially with the star quality of Pitt just helping things glide along.
F1 races into theaters on June 27th
