True to life or not, ‘F1' movie taps into sport's rich history of drama

TimesLIVE

4 days ago

The racing scenes in Brad Pitt's F1 movie are impressively authentic, but the filmmakers have also made much of how the sport's past is woven into the plot, with a hefty slice of Hollywood artistic licence.
"We drew from history. A little this, a little that, then we had Lewis Hamilton keep us straight," Pitt said at a New York premiere ahead of this week's general release in cinemas.
Apple's senior vice-president of services Eddy Cue, a lifelong Formula One fan and Ferrari board member, told reporters after a media screening "there's not a single event in here that hasn't happened in a real race".
That does not mean, of course, that such events could happen or that they served as anything more than inspiration.
The Apple Original Films blockbuster, with scenes shot during grand prix weekends, is a redemption story, with Pitt playing ageing driver Sonny Hayes on an unlikely comeback alongside a young hotshot at a struggling team.
Seven-times world champion Hamilton provided advice and is credited as a co-producer on a movie scripted for audiences unfamiliar with the sport.
Pitt's age, 61, has been called out as unrealistic for a driver in the modern era but as Hamilton, 40, said when filming started in 2023: "Brad looks like he's ageing backwards."
The oldest F1 driver is Spaniard Fernando Alonso who will be 44 next month, but in the 1950s, when physical demands were less but dangers greater, Philippe Etancelin and Louis Chiron raced at 55. Luigi Fagioli was a winner at 53.
F1 comebacks also tend to follow short absences, one or two years at most, but it was not always the case.
Dutch driver Jan Lammers raced from 1979 to 1982 and was out for more than a decade, when he won Le Mans and raced at Daytona, before returning in 1992. Italian Luca Badoer also had 10 years between races before a short-lived comeback in 2009.