鈥淭op Gun: Maverick鈥 filmmaker Joseph Kosinski came to Formula One like many Americans: 鈥淒rive to Survive.鈥
In that popular Netflix series, he saw the potential for a cinematic event, full of immersive thrills, the high stakes of the competitive racing world and the idea that your teammate could be your greatest rival.
鈥淚 don鈥檛 think there鈥檚 any other sport that鈥檚 quite like that,鈥 Kosinski said. 鈥淚t鈥檚 ripe for drama.鈥
The movies have loved car racing since their earliest days, and the popularity of F1 has exploded in recent years. Giving it the 鈥淭op Gun鈥 treatment made sense. But it would take nearly four years for that dream to become 鈥淔1,鈥 which is speeding into movie theaters on June 27.
It was a complex operation that would involve unprecedented coordination with the league, groundbreaking innovation in camera technology, and letting one of the biggest movie stars in the world, , drive a real race car at 180 miles an hour on film. Many, many times.
Getting F1 on board
Hollywood, it turned out, was a little easier to convince to make the film than the league. By the time Kosinski and producer approached them, Pitt had already agreed to star and they鈥檇 decided to go with Apple to help make the movie at the level they needed, with the guarantee of a robust theatrical release (which Warner Bros. is handling). Then came the Formula One meeting.
鈥淲hen you come in, the first thing they think is you鈥檙e going to make them look bad,鈥 Bruckheimer said. 鈥淚 went through this with when I went to the Navy the first time on 鈥楾op Gun.鈥欌
There were many concerns: About anything going wrong, accidents, and the question of the villain. But, the filmmakers explained, this story wasn鈥檛 about a villain. It鈥檚 a competition between two drivers 鈥 a younger driver and an older driver (Pitt) trying to make him better.
Bruckheimer said it took almost a year to get the league on board, and then they had to go around to the individual teams to explain it to them as well. But once everyone bought in, they committed and opened their world to the filmmakers.
鈥淭he amount of, let鈥檚 say, conversations regarding things not related to the actual filmmaking has been massive just from a coordination point of view,鈥 Kosinski said. 鈥淏ut there鈥檚 no way we could have made this film without that partnership with Formula One.鈥
Among the things they got to do: Build a garage at the Grand Prix for their fictional team; Drive on the track during Grand Prix weekends in front of hundreds of thousands of spectators; Put their Formula One cars on the track with the film鈥檚 cars (and drivers); Have Pitt and Idris stand at the end of the national anthem in both and ; And sit in on drivers meetings and technical briefings.
鈥淚t was full-on integration of these two worlds coming together,鈥 Kosinski said. 鈥淭here鈥檚 no way the film could have happened or look like it does without that partnership. I think you鈥檒l see the result of that on screen because you couldn鈥檛 recreate what we were able to capture by doing it for real.鈥
鈥淲e鈥檙e going to need a smaller camera鈥
In true 鈥淭op Gun鈥 spirit, part of 鈥渄oing it for real鈥 meant trying to create the experience in the driver seat for the audience. Seven-time champion Lewis Hamilton, who was involved in the film from the earliest days, told Kosinski that he鈥檇 never seen a film that had really captured what it felt like to be in one of those cars.
鈥淭hese Formula One cars, they deal in grams,鈥 Kosinski said. 鈥淎dding 100 pounds of camera equipment works against the very thing you鈥檙e trying to capture. It became a technical engineering project for a year to figure out how to get very tiny cameras that are IMAX quality onto one of these cars.鈥
During 鈥淭op Gun: Maverick,鈥 they had six Sony cameras inside the cockpit. Here, engineers were able to slim those down to about a quarter of the size (he estimates a 10x10 cm cube). Panavision also developed a remote control that allowed director of photography Claudio Miranda to pivot the cameras left and right, which they didn鈥檛 have on 鈥淢averick.”
They had 15 camera mounts built into the cars and were able to run up to four at a time keeping the weight penalty to a minimum, and the close-ups real.
鈥淓very time you see Brad or Damson鈥檚 face, they鈥檙e really driving that car,鈥 Kosinski said. 鈥淚t鈥檚 not being driven for them.鈥
And once it was go-time on the tracks, it was a race against the clock.
鈥淚t was a technical feat and an organizational feat,鈥 Bruckheimer said. 鈥淵ou get limited access and we鈥檇 get in there between some of their qualifying laps and have eight minutes to get on the track and off the track. It鈥檚 precision, you can鈥檛 be at nine minutes.鈥
When Hamilton first saw some of their racing footage cut together, Kosinski got a confidence boost.
鈥淗e smiled and said, 鈥業t looks fast,鈥欌 Kosinski said. 鈥淚 was like, 鈥極h, thank God.鈥 If Lewis says that we鈥檙e in a good place.鈥
The Brad Pitt factor
鈥淭his movie needed an icon kind of at the center of it,鈥 Kosinski said. 鈥淚t鈥檚 a big, complicated, expensive film. And I needed one of our, you know, top, top movie stars.鈥
Kosinski knew Pitt liked cars. About a decade ago he, Tom Cruise and Pitt actually developed a car movie that never came to be. Plus, he said, 鈥淚 just felt like it was a role that I always wanted to see him play.鈥
The character is fictional driver named Sonny Hayes who was 鈥渢he greatest who never was.鈥 A phenomenon in the 1990s, he was destined to be the next world champion before an accident at a Grand Prix ends his Formula One career.
鈥淣ow he drives in every type of racing league you could imagine, but not Formula 1,鈥 Kosinski said, from Le Mans to swamp trucks. 鈥淗e likes to challenge himself to a new racing league and master it, but then he walks away.鈥
The audience meets him driving the midnight shift at the Daytona 24 hour race where he meets his old teammate and now Formula One team owner (Javier Bardem) who asks him to come back to help them win one race to save them from being sold.
鈥淚t鈥檚 a story about a last place team, a group of underdogs, and Sonny Hayes in his later years having one more chance to do something he was never able to, which is win a race in F1,鈥 Kosinski said.
After the pitch, they went to the racetrack with Hamilton and Pitt 鈥渨as hooked.鈥
Pitt trained for three months before cameras started rolling to get used to the physical demands of the precision vehicles. He and his co-star really drove the cars at speeds up to 180 mph, and sometimes in front of a couple hundred thousand people.
鈥淭he happiest day was when they said, 鈥極K, it鈥檚 a wrap on driving,鈥 and he (Brad) climbed out of the car,鈥 Bruckheimer said. 鈥淭hat was the best day for me because it is dangerous, it really is.鈥
The perfect summer blockbuster?
The film, everyone has acknowledged, was enormously expensive. They had the advantage of advertising on the cars, which helped offset some of the costs, but the operation was akin to building a real F1 team, Bruckheimer said. They built six cars, which they transported all around the world along with production.
鈥淚t鈥檚 like an army exercise moving vast groups of people and machinery around the world,鈥 Bruckheimer said.
But it was much less than the $300 million figure going around, both Kosinski and Bruckheimer said.
鈥淚t鈥檚 expensive, don鈥檛 get me wrong. It鈥檚 an expensive movie. But it was substantially lower than that number,鈥 Bruckheimer said. 鈥淗ollywood is a very competitive place, and our friends sometimes inflate our budgets to make them look better.鈥
The biggest question is whether audiences will turn out in blockbuster numbers. So far, test scores have been very high across genders. And they promise you don鈥檛 need to be an expert or even a fan of the sport to enjoy the film, which will teach you everything you need to know.
鈥淚t鈥檚 emotional, it鈥檚 exciting, it has humor. It鈥檚 got great music with a Hans Zimmer score and a bunch of phenomenal artists,鈥 Bruckheimer said. 鈥淲e hope it鈥檚 a perfect summer movie.”
To join the conversation set a first and last name in your user profile.
Sign in or register for free to join the Conversation