“Rush,” the Ron Howard-directed film on the James Hunt-Niki Lauda Grand Prix rivalry, is not historically accurate. It plays fast and loose enough with the facts that in many ways its misleading. Yet, while its not a documentary,the film tells an emotionally compelling tale that even those who did not follow Formula One racing in the 1970s can enjoy. Rushs storytelling is certainly better than the previous best Formula One feature, John Frankenheimers “Grand Prix,” from the 1960s. Maybe thats because the 1960s feature tried to tell too many stories at the same time. The two films premises were similar: outlaw driver comes back to win the world championship, injured driver makes a miraculous comeback from a devastating crash, wife leaves a driver. But while “Grand Prix“ spread this tale over a half-dozen drivers “Rush” concentrates on only two. The film carries the image of Chris Hemsworth, who portrays James Hunt, on its posters,but the story is really Laudas, featuring his abrasive and arrogant nature and showing how that carried him through a crash that could have killed him. The fictional Hunt come across as childish as he was perceived in the 1970s. portrayal of Lauda carries the film, especially his depiction of fighting through intense pain inthe hospital sequence. The films rivalry premise holds up even though Hunt and Lauda actually shared a an apartment early in their careers, and despite the fact that the Formula Three race that opens the never had a Hunt-versus -Lauda duel for the race. However,the new film does make the best of the rivalry with its scenes between Hunt and Lauda, which whether fictional or not, make a well-told story. The one place where “Grand Prix remains superior to “Rush” is in its racing sequences. “Grand Prix” was filmed at the actual 1960s race tracks in bright Super Panavision and screened at Cinerama theaters that were then the state of the art. ”Rush” was saddled with the need to reuse the same pit and paddock area over and over again ,with only a few apparently digitally composited establishing shots to give a vague impression that the racing sequences took place at the tracks mentioned in the script, rather than at a few anonymous British track. As with all 21st-century movies, xenon lamps cant compete with 1960s carbon arc illumination,and the presumably state of the art Texas Instruments DLP Cinema projection system used in the theater where I screened “Rush” looked muddy, and aliasing was spotted in the films subtitles.
Posted on: Tue, 15 Oct 2013 16:02:30 +0000
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