F1 is the biggest summer blockbuster to date. With Superman and Fantastic Four: First Steps presumably coming for that crown later this month, it’s a shortlived title, but an accurate one nonetheless. To beat the heat, audiences can crowd in to watch Brad Pitt breathtakingly drive around a Formula One track. That alone is a winning formula. Coming from Joseph Kosinski, the acclaimed director of Top Gun: Maverick, F1 has been billed as Maverick but with cars. It is very much that, which is far from a bad thing.

F1 Mirrors Top Gun in Many Ways

Comparison is the thief of joy, especially when it comes to movies. Art is very difficult to compare. There’s no meaningful comparison to be made between The Lego Movie and The Pianist, for example. They’re wildly different, and there are so few ways to compare one film to another without being arbitrary.

However, F1 does us all the favor of being similar enough that the Top Gun: Maverick comparison is both unfair and inevitable. Kosinski’s previous blockbuster is a landmark of cinema, perhaps the perfect legacy sequel and a stunning feat of filmmaking. His most recent movie is not that, but it’s still a fun time.

Here, we have an old, on-his-way-out legend of the industry who had a bad accident in the past that derailed his career. Said legend is back to mentor a cocky, arrogant young member of the same field who pretty much wants nothing to do with his elder. Sound familiar? That’s because it is.

That’s really a winning formula, and it plays so well here, so it’s forgivable that Kosinski went right back to the well. But it kind of pales in comparison, which is to be expected. F1 has the same high-octane action sequences that make you feel like you’re present for it, just not on the same level as Maverick. Then again, Formula One racing is probably not quite as adrenaline-pumping as flying fighter jets into enemy territory, so perhaps that’s not really a downside.

The F1 racing movie is also missing Tom Cruise. Brad Pitt is a star with plenty of screen presence, but he’s no Cruise. He doesn’t have the acting chops nor quite the iconic status. He does have enough charisma to skate by on a relatively rough performance and not derail the film. His personality works here; he’s just not working with his best stuff.

That’s one of the main downsides to the movie. Pitt isn’t actively hampering the film, and his performance is more mediocre or average than downright bad. The emotional beats just don’t hit quite as hard as they did in Maverick because Pitt isn’t able to go into that well like that.

The rest of the F1 cast is pretty good, which only further puts Pitt’s lackluster performance into the spotlight. Damson Idris is a star in the making, and he plays the arrogant young phenom really well. Kerry Condon is a delight, as always, and Javier Bardem is a standout.

A Team Movie

Each actor in F1 brings life and depth to their characters for the most part. They don’t all necessarily have full character arcs, but more than the main protagonist does, and each of the supporting characters does have a backstory, a personality, and depth of character. They’re not one-note, even if they don’t necessarily undergo a ton of development.

That’s where the F1 film, outside of the action, does shine. This is a Brad Pitt movie about Sonny Hayes, but the runtime devotes plenty of attention to the rare female tech lead played by Kerry Condon. Javier Bardem’s team owner feels almost like a main character. Damson Idris’ Joshua Pierce feels like a genuine co-lead. There’s one main character, but he doesn’t overshadow the rest of the team, which is perhaps a fitting analogy for the whole movie’s plot.

The story is not quite paper-thin, but it was a bit of an afterthought. This is a movie about driving cars really fast, and it does an excellent job showing that off. The plot is designed to drive characters through different spots of the Formula One season, and it does a passable job at that.

It’s a pretty straightforward turn of events, but there’s really no need to reinvent the wheel here. There’s a romance side plot that feels a little rushed and shoehorned in, potentially to give added weight to an emotional scene a little later. It doesn’t exactly succeed there, but it’s the only glaring misfire on the writing end.

There’s also a slight issue of stakes. The stakes feel pretty low, even though it is literally the livelihood of everyone involved. It’s not that we don’t know what’s at risk; it’s just that it never feels like a real fear. That said, this isn’t a movie where the good guys, if this team can be called that for much of the film, win feels inevitable. It most often feels like there’s no way they can win, keeping audience members on their toes.

The score and soundtrack are both good, with Hans Zimmer’s work shining as always. A movie having its own soundtrack isn’t super common, and they did a nice job with this one. The filmmaking team made a bold choice to infuse Zimmer’s dependably reliable tracks with modern, techno music. It could’ve backfired, but it fits the F1 movie so well. It only elevates during key action-packed scenes, and the absence of music in one crucial scene helps it be one of the emotional beats that land successfully.

Final Lap

Score: 4/5

Like Nicole Kidman so aptly says, every time I’m in the theater, we essentially go to the movies to have a good time. With that goal in mind, F1 is an excellent time at the theater. It’s fun, from the music to the action, and that’s always a positive thing. By the end of the movie, it genuinely felt like watching one’s own sports team fight tooth and nail to win, an impressive feat to kick off the summer.