F1: The Movie Review, Intense, Realistic, and Built for the Finish Line
In F1: The Movie, Brad Pitt stars as Sonny Hayes, playing a man who was once destined to be the greatest F1 driver the world had ever seen, better than Senna, Schumacher, all of them, but a career-ending crash cut that dream short.
Sonny never lost his love for racing, and he spent years jumping into cars at Daytona, Le Mans, wherever he could get behind a wheel for the joy of being behind a steering wheel. Javier Bardem, who plays Sonny’s old friend and the boss of a struggling and underdog F1 team, turns to Sonny, hoping that the retired legend can help the team score some points and a race win.
F1: The Movie’s biggest strength is how real it feels. You’ll feel like you’re watching a two-hour-long episode of Drive to Survive on the big screen. From the roaring soundtrack and background score to the way the actors deliver their lines screams F1. One of the most impressive parts is the way the film mixes actual race footage from real Grand Prix weekends with the fictional story of Sonny Hayes and Apex GP.
It never feels out of place, and you’ll genuinely start to believe that Hayes and his team were actually on that grid, wheel to wheel with the likes of Verstappen, Leclerc, or Hamilton.
Behind-the-scenes drama is just as intense and real. You see drivers arguing over whose fault a crash was, fists flying in the paddock, slamming doors after a race gone wrong, and it all feels real. Also, we get to see the off-track grind, including media appearances, endless sponsor duties, and the constant pressure of keeping your seat. A few harrowing on-track crash scenes are also there to remind us that in F1, everything can change in a heartbeat.
The cast in F1: The Movie is absolutely top-tier, and one of the standout dynamics is the brief but fiery rivalry between the two Apex GP drivers, Brad Pitt’s Sonny Hayes and Damson Idris’s JP. That emotional anchor of the film is the the chemistry between Brad Pitt and Javier Bardem. Bardem plays Sonny’s old racing friend who owns Apex GP. One scene in particular, where they open a bottle of champagne and shout “We are the best in the world!” together, is the icing on the cake.
Kerry Condon portrays Kate McKenna, who is the first female lead engineer in the sport, trying to prove that women do belong in the world of F1. The movie also features cameos from some of the biggest current F1 stars, including Lewis Hamilton (who’s also one of the film’s producers), Charles Leclerc, Carlos Sainz, Lando Norris, Pierre Gasly, and others. All in all, F1: The Movie is a brilliant film, and probably the best Joseph Kosinski film after “Tron” and “Only the Brave.
