Buckle up for a thrilling ride

Buckle up for a thrilling ride

Review: Sports action

RUSH (M18)

122 minutes/Opening on Sep 26, 2013/

The story: The rivalry between British race-car driver James Hunt (Chris Hemsworth) and Austrian Niki Lauda (Daniel Bruhl) begins in the early 1970s, when both are rookies. The handsome Hunt is a swaggering, sybaritic sex god, while Lauda is brusque and methodical. As they climb the league tables, the intensity of their rivalry grows. In 1976, both men are neck to neck for the championship.

On the German leg of the tour, Lauda urges other drivers to boycott the race as the rain has left the track unsafe. Hunt scoffs at the Austrian's caution and insists that the race continue.

A movie about Formula One drivers opening now? Surely, this is a blatant cashing-in on the same race just held here. But believe it or not, its release during this period is a coincidence because several countries, including the United States, are releasing it now as well.

So it would be unfair to dismiss this exciting, brilliantly photographed work as tie-in merchandising, especially not when the names attached to it include screenwriter Peter Morgan (nominated for Oscars for Frost/Nixon, 2008, and The Queen, 2006) and director Ron Howard (also nominated for an Oscar for Frost/Nixon and winning one for A Beautiful Mind, 2002).

Morgan's biggest hurdle in telling the story is that while both men were adored by fans, neither were particularly wonderful human beings.

Hunt was a rock star and had an ego to match. Lauda in his prime fit the Germanic stereotype of a cold fish and was abrasively blunt.

There is little sugarcoating to be seen here. Hunt is shown to be a terrible husband to wife Suzy (Olivia Wilde), while Lauda appears to have little time for anything that does not contribute to his personal victories on the track.

The screenwriter handles the likeability issue largely by trusting in director Howard and the lead actors Hemsworth and Bruhl to transmit the humanity of the characters in small moments of vulnerability.

In every biopic, there will inevitably be scenes when hubris comes to knock the hero off his pedestal and here, Hunt and Lauda get their comeuppances as well.

But Morgan, to his credit, does shoehorn in big learning moments. In F1, teams play the long points game, stretched over the racing year and Morgan does the same - he doles out the empathy cumulatively. It largely works, and Howard thankfully offers the same restraint.

No official help nor sanction from the F1 body was given to the production and this shows in the truthful depiction of how safety was of little concern to the sport's officials in the 1960s and 1970s.

F1 fans have said this is a film for people who know nothing about F1 and they have a point, but it will be a rare day indeed when a big-budget sports movie tailor-made for aficionados gets greenlit (the same goes for Star Trek movies or any topic with a geek fanbase).

For the racing scenes, Howard puts the viewer inside the driver's seat and the ride is exhilarating, if tinnitus-inducing. The squeal of the engine, the tunnel vision, the mind-boggling speed of the turns - he makes it clear why drivers are venerated by fans.

He also brings home the point of how dangerous the sport was in the 1970s and how drivers then had to be not just obsessed with the sport, but also be willing to lay down their lives for it.

Background story

Top 10 movies

SINGAPORE

1. (-) Prisoners

2. (-) 2 Guns

3. (3) We're The Millers

4. (-) We're A Nice Normal Family

5. (-) Riddick

6. (1) Disney's Planes

7. (4) Percy Jackson: Sea Of Monsters

8. (-) The World's End

9. (7) Ilo Ilo

10. (-) My Lucky Star

Information from Cinematograph Film Exhibitors Association

UNITED STATES

1. (-) Prisoners

2. (1) Insidious: Chapter 2

3. (2) The Family (We're A Nice Normal Family)

4. (6) Instructions Not Included

5. (-) Battle Of The Year

6. (5) We're The Millers

7. (4) Lee Daniels' The Butler

8. (3) Riddick

9. (-) The Wizard Of Oz 3-D/Imax

10. (7) Disney's Planes


Get a copy of The Straits Times or go to straitstimes.com for more stories.

 

This website is best viewed using the latest versions of web browsers.