F1 the Movie is set to release in cinemas later this month, starring Brad Pitt in Formula One’s answer to Tom Cruise’s Top Gun Maverick.
In fact, the latter’s director has helmed the upcoming sports drama about an older driver brought out of retirement to mentor a rookie played by Damson Idris.
Alongside Pitt and a cast including Javier Bardem, all 10 F1 teams and their drivers feature in the film as themselves, including Lewis Hamilton – who is a producer and consultant.
The British champion originally wanted to be in Top Gun Maverick but the timings didn’t work out. Nevertheless, director Kosinski ended up bringing him on as a technical advisor on F1, which has cameras on the actors as they speed along just like in the Tom Cruise blockbuster.
As a result, Hamilton played a crucial role in telling filmmakers when they used the wrong gear on a turn.
Hamilton was also “adamant’ that the actors experienced the actual speed, so the film ended up using little CGI.
He told The Times: “Throughout my career I would tell people how difficult it is in a race, And they would ask, ‘How much weight did you lose?’ or ‘What bruises do you have?’ We can lose up to ten pounds [during a race], so having these actors go through the challenges we do as racing drivers — the speed in which you’re processing information, the effect on the body, the G-force — was really important. Because you can’t fake that.”
So when you see Pitt racing, he’s actually driving at 180mph. Kosinski added: “The expression on his face, that concentration and intensity? It’s all real. That’s not him acting — he is trying to keep himself alive at that moment.”