4 days ago
How F1: The Movie locked down an astounding $40 million in real sponsorship
The Brad Pitt racing action film F1: The Movie dominated the box office over its opening weekend, pulling in $55.6 million domestically and $144 million world wide. It's the best performance not only for an Apple original film, it's also the biggest opening weekend for any live-action movie based on racing (it beat out Talladega Nights: The Ballad of Ricky Bobby's $47 million).
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While the budget of F1: The Movie has been estimated anywhere from $200-$300 million, a piece of that has apparently been chipped away by actual sponsorship sales. In the fictional story, washed up driver Sonny Hayes (Pitt) ends up joining the APX GP Formula 1 racing team alongside up-and-coming rookie Joshua Pearce (Damson Idris). While APX GP isn't a real team, the sponsorships for the driving team certainly were.
According to Forbes, producer David Leneer racked up around $40 million in actual sponsorships, including Mercedes, OMP, Tommy Hilfiger, Shark, Geico, EA Sports and APX GP's main sponsor Expensify. Leneer, who Forbes' Matt Craig described as "a pioneer of brand integrations in movies for nearly 30 years," brought in more dollars for F1: The Movie than his other projects like Top Gun: Maverick or the National Treasure and Transformers series.
It's a far more natural fit to put brands and logos into a movie that features a sport that is normally covered in brands and logos, but it is certainly a fascinating piece to Apple's latest release.
