Brad Pitt and his Pitt crew risk life and limb to bring us the F1 trailer

The story of a "never was" training an up-and-comer speeds into theaters this summer. 

By Matt Schimkowitz  |  March 13, 2025 | 3:09pm
Courtesy of Warner Bros. Pictures
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Brad Pitt and his Pitt crew risk life and limb to bring us the F1 trailer
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If F1 is supposed to be this year’s Top Gun: Maverick, i.e., a non-superhero-based action movie that relies more on old-school, real-world filmmaking, stars doing their own stunts, and an intense clarity of intent, they’re off to a good start. The new trailer for F1, which Apple has kept locked in the garage under strict security, is here for a test drive, and the ride is smooth.

Brad Pitt plays Sonny Hayes, a rakish NASCAR driver who is becoming better known for drinking and gambling than for driving. Worse than a “has been,” people see him as a “never was.” Still, Javier Bardem believes he could be the perfect driving instructor for an up-and-coming rookie Formula 1 driver, Joshua Pearce (Damson Idris), who doesn’t trust or respect his new coach. The set-up alone was made for Saturday afternoons on TNT, giving audiences a sports movie formula in an action movie context. To that end, director Joseph Kosinski is making another Top Gun-sized gambit. Strapping his cameras to the racer, Kosinski hopes to do for Formula 1 what he did for fighter jet piloting, using a slew of mini cameras and positioning them throughout the car to give viewers every angle of every turn. Will it work? It certainly looks promising. They even got a militaristic version of Fleetwood Mac’s “The Chain.” What more could audiences ask for?

Here’s the trailer:

Like Top Gun: Maverick, director Joseph Kosinski is again pushing the authenticity of the stunts. “Every time you see Brad or Damson driving this movie,” Kosinski said during a virtual Q&A, “they’re driving on their own in one of these real race cars on a real F1 track.” Kosinski shot F1 during actual races over the course of the season, stealing shots before the race and in nine-minute slots that the director likened to “a live stage play, but in front of thousands of people, shooting at 180 miles an hour.”

Unlike Top Gun, Kosinski needed the cameras needed to be able to move while driving. “You can’t put 60 pounds of gear on a racecar and expect it’s going to perform the same way,” he said. Cars were built to fit the specs, allowing for car mounts that he could control. “We have motorized mounts on the car as well. So you have transmitters that are transmitting the picture back,” Kosinski continued. “We’ve got transmitters controlling the movement of the camera. I’m sitting at the base station with Claudio, our cinematographer looking at 16 screens. I’ve got camera operators on the controls for the cameras and it’s calling out.”

Listen to the baby purr. But is it enough to put us in an F1 today? We’ll see on June 27, 2025, when F1 races into theaters.

 
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