This trailer has us more excited for a racing movie than we have been in a very long time. The Ron Howard movie “Rush” is a profile of the 1976 Formula One season and more specifically the battle between Brit James Hunt and German Niki Lauda for the Formula One Championship. The two men were polar opposites in many ways. Hunt was a notorious party guy with appetites for women, booze, and drugs that were (reportedly) unmatched on the circuit. He also had talent by the bucket load. Lauda was a much more buttoned down guy who took racing at the most serious of levels. He was one of the most vocal drivers of the mid-1970s to stand up for improved safety at tracks and facilities all over the world.
We’re not going to blow the whole amazing story of this two man battle in ’76 for you. Look it up if you want to see how the tale played out in real life and how it will play out on the big screen. It was the closest F1 finish in history…we’ll leave it at that. Howard has used both real and replica 1976 vintage Formula One cars to make this movie and filmed lots of the racing action on famous tracks like the ‘Ring. It promises to be very, very good.
PRESS PLAY BELOW TO SEE THE NEWLY RELEASED TRAILER FOR THE FORMULA ONE MOVIE RUSH!
But for the “based on a true story” angle and the director’s resume’, I’d be afraid this one is “Daze-of-Thunder-Meets-Driven.”
It does look like “Opie” has studied the close-ups of Frankenheimer’s “Grand Prix” (1966) and developed some new camera angles. And hopefully the computer-generated parts will look more like “Le Mans” (1971) instead of “Speed Racer” (2008) or some video game.
But why is it that nearly every non-comedy film about racing has to be jam-packed with all that “racing = death” claptrap?
I think it looks bitchin cant wait to see it
I think the Death drama was real in this era, Peter Reveson, Mark Donhue, Ronnie Peterson, Giles Villinue and other would agree
For much of F1’s history, racing did equal a very real possibility of death. As the quote in LeMan goes racing… “is a professional blood sport.”
Most certainly, the specter of death has been real for much of racing history. But I strongly suspect the vast majority of the top-level racers did not dwelt on it much (not nearly as much as the movies suggest). In fact, most of ’em probably believed that death was something that always happened to “the other guy” and that they were so talented (or lucky or blessed) that it wouldn’t happen to them.
When professional racers start doubting that, they retire . . . See e.g. Jackie Stewart.
War movies tend not to have their heros musing about death (they respect the audiences enough to understand that by implication of circumstances heroism risks life and limb). So why must auto racing films keep tilling the same ground over and over and over. Are auto racing film audiences that stupid?
Look up the BBC documentary about F1s Killer years, I think its available on Vimeo.
Jackie Stewart lead a significant effort to make F1 safer.
And another thing, who would want to go on track with a moron who says stupid stuff like “the closer you are to death, the more alive you feel.” Racing at all levels involves a measure of trust . . . that you can trust your opponents to race you hard but fairly . . . and with respect as to what can happen.
A jacka$$ who’s riding some sort of near-death wish “high” lacks the maturity and discipline to be a safe professional racer.
That’s why he was known as “Hunt the shunt”
No surprise that he died at 45 years of age.