Love making movies for the big screen, those are the ones I grew up watching: 'F1' director Joseph Kosinski

Hindustan Times

17-06-2025

New Delhi, As someone who grew up on a diet of big movies in theatres, filmmaker Joseph Kosinski says he loves films that give audiences a thrilling ride whether it is with Tom Cruise-starrer "Top Gun: Maverick" or his upcoming Brad Pitt-starrer "F1", an action adventure set in the world of Formula One racing.
Kosinski's other credits include Cruise-starrer "Oblivion", a story that the director initially wrote as a graphic novel, and "Tron: Legacy" as well as "Only the Brave".
"I love making films for the big screen. I think now it's more important than ever that we get people out of their homes to see this. So you have to give them a reason to go to the theatre, and that's what I'm hoping to do with 'F1'," the filmmaker told PTI in a virtual interview.
"Those are the kind of movies I grew up going to see in the theatre when I was a kid in the 80s and 90s. I remember seeing 'Top Gun', 'Raiders of the Lost Ark', big movies that take you into this world for two hours, send you on an adventure and then spit you out in the end and you can't wait to take the ride again," he added.
Kosinski said the world of Formula One fascinated him and he thought it would be great to set a "big screen experience" within it.
The movie revolves around a once-promising racer Sonny Hayes , whose former teammate Ruben Cervantes ropes in Pitt as a last-ditch effort to reverse the ailing fortunes of his F1 team. The team also has a successful rookie Joshua Pierce .
Asked how is it to direct big stars like Pitt and Cruise, the filmmaker said they both love new challenges.
"I think both Brad and Tom feel the same way. They're both at the top of their game, incredible professionals. They have great taste in films and stories. They understand how to develop a character. They're both incredible actors. And Brad was someone I always wanted to work with.
"I thought this would be the perfect role for him. And luckily, he did, too, and it was just an incredible collaboration. I had an incredible time. And yeah, I'm excited for people to see his performance in this film, because I think it's really special," he added.
Lewis Hamilton, who has won seven Formula One World Drivers' Championship titles, is one of the producers on the movie. Kosinski said Hamilton was one of the first people he reached out to when he thought about making a movie on Formula One racing.
"I asked him if he would help me make this film as authentic as possible. And he said yes. So he worked very closely with me and Jerry Bruckheimer and Brad from the beginning to help craft this story and character. We went through every line of the script together, making sure we got every detail right," he said.
Kosinski's experience of working on "Top Gun: Maverick" came handy while shooting for this movie and one of them was to invent a brand new camera system.
"The tools didn't exist to make this movie... We created a new prototype camera that's very small but delivers IMAX quality imagery. Sony built 25 prototypes for us, and we worked with the Mercedes F1 team to create a race car that had camera mounts built into it. So we had 15 or 16 different mount points on this race car," he said.
Both Pitt and Idris were taught how to drive race cars for real.
"When you see them driving in this movie, they are actually driving a race car on a Formula One track during race weekend. So the crowd in the stands is real. When you see other drivers getting in their cars around them, that all happened right before a real Formula One race. The idea was to give the viewer the sense of what it's like to be at one of these events," he said.
Next for Kosinski is "Top Gun 3", which is already in development. Bruckheimer is also producing two of his other movies.
"I've got three films in development, two with Jerry, including a sequel to Top Gun Maverick. Ehren Kruger is writing the script right now, who wrote 'F1' and also worked on 'Top Gun Maverick', so we got an incredible screenwriter working on it. Any opportunity to work with Jerry, I will take it," he added.
"F1", an Apple Original Film, will be distributed in theatres and IMAX worldwide by Warner Bros. Pictures. It is produced by Bruckheimer, Plan B Entertainment, and Lewis Hamilton's Dawn Apollo Films.
It will release in India on June 27 in English, Hindi, Tamil, and Telugu.