'Days of Thunder' Crossover Pitched For 'F1' Sequel To Reunite Brad Pitt And Tom Cruise
Both Top Gun: Maverick and F1: The Movie share two common threads — satisfying the need for speed, and putting Joseph Kosinski in the director's chair. As the Brad Pitt-starring movie steers into theatres, the filmmaker has shared his dream vision for a sequel, and it goes full throttle on the ambition.
Speaking to GQ Magazine UK, Kosinski expressed interest in exploring a Days of Thunder and F1 crossover, which would reunite Pitt and Tom Cruise for the first time after 1994's horror classic Interview With the Vampire .
'Well, right now, it'd be Cole Trickle, who was [Cruise's] Days of Thunder character, we find out that he and [Brad Pitt's] Sonny Hayes have a past,' he said. 'They were rivals at some point, maybe crossed paths… I heard about this epic go-kart battle on Interview With a Vampire that Brad and Tom had, and who wouldn't pay to see those two go head-to-head on the track?'
The idea first blossomed when Kosinski was working to bring his own version of Ford v Ferrari to the big screen. It would have seen the actors pulling off the driving stunts by themselves, but his desired budget was not approved, resulting in a hand-off to James Mangold ( Logan ) and the leading pair of Christian Bale ( The Dark Knight ) and Matt Damon ( The Martian ).
Based on the Formula One World Championship, F1 is developed in collaboration with FIA, its governing body, with Damson Idris ( Snowfall ), Kerry Condon ( Better Call Saul ), Tobias Menzies ( Outlander ), and Javier Bardem ( No Country for Old Man ) serving as co-stars. The film is produced by Jerry Bruckheimer, Kosinski, seven-time F1 world champion Lewis Hamilton, Pitt, Dede Gardner, Jeremy Kleiner, and Chad Oman.
It shares some similarities to the 1990 sports action drama pic Days of Thunder, which follows Cole Trickle, a talented racer who befriends Rowdy after they both end up in a hospital for their antics on a race track, while another competitor tries to create problems for Cole and defeat him. It featured appearances by real-life NASCAR drivers, including Richard Petty, Rusty Wallace, Neil Bonnett, and Harry Gant.
As for the Top Gun: Maverick sequel, Kosinski previously revealed that it was still in the scripting stage with returning screenwriter Ehren Kruger ( Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen , Ghost in the Shell ), but fans can expect an 'ambitious' premise:
'It was about coming up with an idea that, again, felt like a new challenge. Something that opens up the story in a way you just can't let go. And I think the idea is so ambitious. That's what's exciting to me.'
(image credit for header image: Gareth Cattermole / Getty Images)
Si Jia is a casual geek at heart – or as casual as someone with Sephiroth's theme on her Spotify playlist can get. A fan of movies, games, and Japanese culture, Si Jia's greatest weakness is the Steam Summer Sale. Or any Steam sale, really. Brad Pitt Days of Thunder F1: The Movie Joseph Kosinski Tom Cruise
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19 hours ago
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F1: The Movie – Review
Formula 1 has been basking in its Drive to Survive (2019 – present) glow for years now, transforming what was once a niche motorsport into a global sporting obsession. Netflix's slick docuseries introduced newcomers to the sound and fury of the paddock, giving the sport an emotional engine. In a sudden turnaround, names like Max Verstappen, Lewis Hamilton, Charles Leclerc, and Lando Norris were common parlance, even in households that couldn't tell Monza from Monaco. The show didn't need to explain what DRS (Drag Reduction System) was every episode, as it trusted viewers to catch up while feeding them the interpersonal drama that comes from a high-speed chess game played across 24 cities a year. For many, it was the gateway drug as Formula 1, once considered opaque and elitist, became dinner table conversation. F1: The Movie knows that the audience is already onboard. Directed by Joseph Kosinski ( Tron: Legacy ) and produced by Jerry Bruckheimer ( Bad Boys , Pirates of the Caribbean ), both fresh off the mega successful Top Gun: Maverick (2022), the duo have once again built a world of roaring engines, grizzled veterans, and daredevils who mistake the edge of disaster for home. Brad Pitt ( Fight Club , Troy ) plays the ageing underdog (because of course he does) while British race champion driver Hamilton ( Cars 2 ), serving as co-producer, ensures the technical details stay true to form. The result is a movie that doesn't stop to hold your hand as it drops viewers straight onto the grid, where every tenth of a second is a career-defining margin and every decision at 300 kilometres per hour has consequences. Pitt slips effortlessly into the racing boots of Sonny Hayes, a semi-mythical driver cut from the same cloth as Tom Cruise's ( Mission: Impossible ) Maverick – weathered, stubborn, dangerously charismatic and a savant in the driver's seat. When Hayes enters the 24 Hours of Daytona track for a one-off endurance race, he drives like a man shaking off ghosts, and wins. Then he leaves, no fanfare, back into obscurity. Enter Ruben Cervantes, Hayes' longtime friend and former teammate played by Javier Bardem ( Skyfall ). Bardem leans into his trademark mix of unhinged charisma and wounded charm, playing an ex-racer turned desperate team boss with a half-smile and a mounting pile of debt. APXGP, the team he now runs, has grown far more familiar with the back of the pack than the winner's podium, and with US$350 million on the line, he needs a miracle to survive and that miracle is Sonny Hayes. Once neck-and-neck with Ruben for Formula 1's spotlight, Hayes flamed out after a brutal crash during a race against Brazilian motorsports racing legend Ayrton Senna. Rather than stage a fictional wreck, director Kosinski splices in real footage of Martin Donnelly's horrifying 1990 Spanish Grand Prix crash, itself an audacious, borderline exploitative move that lends visceral power at the cost of taste. There's something eerily meta about the way Hayes is written, as if Pitt is circling through echoes of his old roles: grimy charm in a trailer à la Cliff Booth in Once Upon a Time… in Hollywood (2019), a laid-back Vegas smoothness like Rusty Ryan in the Ocean's franchise (2001-2007), and flashes of moody introspection from Roy Richard McBride in Ad Astra (2019). Hayes is a remix of archetypes who doesn't just break rules; he cruises past them like they're race markers that don't apply to him. And somehow, the movie agrees. But even a superstar comeback needs tension, which arrives in the form of Damson Idris' ( Snowfall ) Joshua Pearce, a hotshot rookie with something to prove and no interest in sharing the spotlight. He's put in the work, earned his place, and sees Hayes as a relic of a past he's trying to surpass. The bravado feels earned, but you can see the cracks when no one's looking. Idris plays those cracks with a kind of restrained grace, letting sarcasm and swagger slip into vulnerability at just the right moments. What makes their relationship work is that Hayes sees it. Maybe for the first time in years, he recognises someone else walking the same razor-thin line between arrogance and doubt. As the races tick by, their relationship is built not on dramatic monologues, but on wariness, competition, and the kind of grudging respect that only forms when both men realise they're chasing the same ghosts. Hayes sees in Pearce a younger version of himself – cocky, hungry, and terrified of losing it all before he ever really gets started. Pearce, in turn, watches Hayes with the suspicion of someone who's had to fight for every inch and isn't about to give up pole position. Their tension softens without ever vanishing, resulting in a partnership built on mutual recognition rather than contrived mentor-mentee sentiment. Adding a different dynamic to the pit is Kate McKenna, played by Kerry Condon ( The Banshees of Inisherin ), who serves as APXGP's sharp-edged technical director. She's sceptical from the moment Hayes walks in, understandably so, since her job (and the team's survival) depends on performance. Condon brings a steely intelligence to Kate, and she reads as the most competent person in any room she walks into, which makes the film's choice to fold her into a romantic subplot all the more deflating. There's an attempt to show mutual respect (two professionals finding a brief connection under pressure), but it ends up feeling like a reluctant box-tick for formulaic storytelling. What's frustrating is that McKenna represents a growing shift within motorsport, where more women are entering roles beyond the sidelines: engineers, strategists, team bosses. You can feel F1: The Movie trying to nod to that progress, especially with Condon's presence and a few quick shots of women in the pit lane and grandstands but it's clear intent only gets you so far. Formula 1's gender imbalance remains glaring, and the movie gestures at change without committing to saying anything meaningful about it. What makes it worse, for all the attention to realism in Formula 1's mechanics, it stumbles when it comes to believability. Kosinski's eye for speed and chaos hasn't dulled, but when Hayes repeatedly pulls off stunts that would trigger immediate disqualification from the Fédération Internationale de l'Automobile (FIA) in real life, the film starts to veer dangerously close to parody. There's one particularly egregious moment involving a purposeful crash that feels less like a daring move, and more like 2008's Renault Formula One crash controversy, also known as Crashgate, minus any of the consequences. Any viewer remotely familiar with how tightly Formula 1 is regulated would find it hard to believe the FIA would let APXGP continue unchecked after that incident. That being said, the film is at its strongest when it respects the visual grammar of the sport, even as it occasionally rewrites the rules. Kosinski smartly grounds the film by weaving his fictional team into real events, blurring the line between fabrication and fandom (drivers Verstappen, Leclerc, Norris, Carlos Sainz, Oscar Piastri, Fernando Alonso, and more appear in short cameos that add to the overall realism of the film). The pacing lifts with the hum of engines and squeal of tyres, elevated by Hans Zimmer's ( Inception , Interstellar ) kinetic score fresh off his Days of Thunder (1990) legacy. His music pulses through each turn, feeding into the tension of a slick curve or a critical pit stop, where every second counts. And just when it feels like the engines can't scream any louder, cinematographer Claudio Miranda's ( Oblivion ) camera launches into overdrive. Mounted on cockpits, wedged into wheel wells, swinging under spoilers… with some shot using Apple's iPhone camera technology, it captures every frame like it's riding shotgun with a death wish. It's bravura technical filmmaking that evokes Grand Prix (1967) and Le Mans (1971), but juiced with modern precision. If Top Gun (1986) made you feel like you were flying, F1: The Movie plants you in the driver's seat and slams the pedal hard into the visceral rush of it all. That's the formula Kosinski sticks to: grip, go, don't over-explain. Where some sports dramas dig into soul-searching monologues or try to reinvent the wheel, F1: The Movie just wants to go fast in its 2 hours and 36 minutes runtime (roughly the time Ferrari needs to make a strategy call), and damn if it doesn't look good doing it. The emotional beats may be familiar, the dialogue occasionally pre-programmed, but once the tyres screech and the camera dives, none of that really matters. Because sometimes, all you want is for the car to go so fast it starts to shake the screen and leave rubber marks on your retinas. And honestly? It might be onto something. Summary For all its missteps, F1: The Movie understands one thing better than most: speed is cinema. The plotlines may veer close to parody, but every pit stop, downshift, and overtaking manoeuvre buys it just enough goodwill to keep racing toward the finish. Story - 6.5/10 Direction - 7.5/10 Characterisation - 7/10 Geek Satisfaction - 7.5/10 Natalie is a big fan of anything related to movies, TV shows, and anime — you name it. When she's not reading or being a dedicated cinephile, she's probably playing gacha and tabletop games, or daydreaming of Caleb from Love and Deepspace . F1 F1 The Movie Joseph Kosinski Review
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'Days of Thunder' Crossover Pitched For 'F1' Sequel To Reunite Brad Pitt And Tom Cruise
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With Lilo & Stitch and How to Train Your Dragon dominating the global box office, live-action adaptations are certainly basking in the glow of their overwhelming success. Disney is set to keep the ball rolling, as a sequel to the reimagined take on the 2002 animated classic is officially in the works. The project was announced on 26 June, or 6/26 in American format — a clever nod to the alien's government name, Experiment 626. In a brief teaser shared on social media, the agent of chaos drives a hot-pink convertible through the studio's Burbank parking lot, shouting, 'Get ready. Here we go!' before drifting Not much else is known about Lilo & Stitch 2 , including returning or new cast members and the creative team, but its development was never in doubt. The first film, directed by Dean Fleischer Camp based on Chris Kekaniokalani Bright and Mike Van Waes' script, surpassed US$850 million worldwide after only four weekends of release, with the House of Mouse already eyeing a follow-up ahead of its opening weekend. The original animated darling was helmed by Chris Sanders and Dean DeBlois, following the titular girl, played by Maia Kealoha in the live-action, who befriends an on-the-run alien genetically engineered as a creature of destruction. Coincidentally, the duo also worked on the How to Train Your Dragon animated movies for DreamWorks, and reunited on Universal's live-action debut as executive producer and director-writer, respectively. A sequel is in development, with the likelihood of deviating from the original narrative. It's unclear how Lilo & Stitch 2 will continue the adventures of, well, Lilo and Stitch, but the pic is expected to adapt 2005's Stitch Has a Glitch , which Disney+ describes as such: 'Your favourite characters return in this heartwarming comedy about bringing friends and family together — even when they seem worlds apart. Before the other 625 experiments land in Hawaii, Stitch is living the good life; he even helps Lilo follow in the footsteps of her mother as she prepares for the big island hula contest. But when Stitch gets a glitch, their perfect world goes haywire. Now it's going to take Lilo, Nani, Jumba and a whole lotta 'ohana for them to save their funny little friend. ' Si Jia is a casual geek at heart – or as casual as someone with Sephiroth's theme on her Spotify playlist can get. A fan of movies, games, and Japanese culture, Si Jia's greatest weakness is the Steam Summer Sale. Or any Steam sale, really. Disney Lilo & Stitch 2 Live-Action
