I’ve been meaning to watch F1, the new Brad Pitt movie about race cars, for quite some time. I hadn’t really read anything specifically about it, but I’d picked up good buzz around the film and (this is going to sound silly) I’ve always wanted to understand F1 racing more. When I served my mission in Germany, Germans loved F1 racing. It had a lot of the same vibes American football has for me here in the states. As a missionary, I didn’t really have the chance to figure it out that much, and I’d wanted to change that. Yes, I realize that if I truly wanted to understand it more, then I could have . . . picked up a book or done a Google search, and that would likely be more informative), but it wouldn’t have been fun.
There’s enough garbage going on in the world right now. I’d like a bit of fun.
So last night, we finally watched it as a family, and it was very well received by all of us. It’s a sports movie, people. It does what it says on the box. Brad Pitt is an aging driver brought on by a struggling F1 racing team that has a rookie driver with potential. You could think of it as a live action version of Cars, or (as I put it at the end of the movie) Mary Poppins for F1 racing. (I personally like the Mary Poppins analogy most.) Is your life going to change having seen it? Nope. But I’m pretty sure you’ll have a good time for 2.5 hours while it’s playing.
It looked great on my home theater system. Soundtrack, acting, effects, cinematography: all of them spot on. My one critique would be that the plot wasn’t exactly a piece of art, but it was good enough not to get in the way. Two thirds of the way through the movie, I knew it would end one of three ways. So, not exactly predictable, but at the same time, I didn’t really mind at all. (Kind of like if you go to a steak house and end up buying a steak, you could say your evening was pretty predictable. But if it’s a good steak, why do you care? And if you didn’t want a steak, why did you go to a steak house?)
In any case, it’s on AppleTV even as we speak, and I definitely recommend it whether you have a clue about F1 racing or not. (And apparently AppleTV is also showing all the F1 races this season. I’ll definitely be checking some of those out as well.)