Racing scene from Apple Original Films’ “F1 The Movie,” now in theaters and IMAX.
* F1 the Movie is brilliant. Brilliant in cinematography and technical innovation — and possibly even more brilliant in further commodifying this breakout sport.
You can suspect that the movie’s plot would be unsophisticated, and you’d be right. But that’s not why to see this movie – it is so big, so immersive, that it feels more like an F1 experience rather than just something you watch.
Damson Idris as Joshua Pearce and Brad Pitt as Sonny Hayes in Apple Original Films’ “F1 The Movie,” now in theaters and IMAX.
The experience
The experience is electric. Formula One vibes are turned up to 11, and we are here for it. Driving, tracks, spectacle, F1 personalities, and all. We went in aiming to set aside tendencies to nitpick and enjoy it as a product of its medium – an entertaining story. As such, it wins the day, and we hope it will be a runaway success for Apple and F1. You know, because we want to see more things like it.
We were curious whether the filmmakers could compete with already impressive visuals that fans are used to seeing in F1’s own broadcasts and in Drive to Survive. They did, and more. To achieve this, Apple built an entirely new camera to capture film-quality cinematography while withstanding 5G in lateral forces and the hammering that cars take from bumps taken at 200 mph. The results are mindblowing. We see racing action and incidents in unprecedented color, clarity, and expansiveness compared to the feeds we are used to 24 weekends a year.
We normally don’t have strong opinions about IMAX, but we do think it is the best format to experience this movie. It is a very big movie, and IMAX makes the most of it. It results in complete immersion, so much so that it’s literally the closest thing we’ve experienced to driving an actual formula car.
The filmmakers blend fiction and reality throughout, splicing the APX GP team into the actual 2023 Formula One season as an 11th team. We see Pitt and Idris in many settings with real F1 pilots, and they interact with many of the figures with whom we’ve become so familiar including Toto Wolff and Will Buxton. So committed are the producers to capitalizing on this realism that they invented a fictional team that has attracted real sponsors – how is that for seamless product placement? You can even find the fictional team’s gear in the Official F1 Store.
Ultimately, we think F1 The Movie wins on stunning visuals, immersive action, and like-you-were there F1 vibes. And we think that’s a brilliant approach to get millions of people to watch a 2 hr 36 min promotion for its product.