Dual Academy Award winner Brad Pitt is being backed by Formula 1 to take the sport to the silver screen in a movie that could be shot during race weekends next season.
Formula 1 is booming right now. Just ask any one of the 440,000 people who flooded through the gates to watch the United States Grand Prix at the weekend.
Maybe it’s all Drive to Survive. Perhaps it’s the lingering adrenaline from last year’s epically close title decide. Maybe it’s all just a post-pandemic spike in getting outside.
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Whatever the reason, people can’t get enough of F1.
The sport is ready to capitalise in new and interesting ways. Luckily enough, one such new and interesting idea appears to have landed in its lap.
It’s long been known that Brad Pitt is behind a project to bring Formula 1 to the silver screen in a new film, with Lewis Hamilton the co-producer. He now appears to have the sport itself on board in a big way, opening some massive and unprecedented doors for access.
The film might be several years away from release, but it sounds like you won’t have to wait quite that long to see some of the action.
Meanwhile, the FIA has concluded its investigation into its handling of the Japanese Grand Prix and made some immediate changes — but whether they’re enough to satisfy the drivers is another question — and Lando Norris has revealed the unusual approach he had to take to deal with the bumps of the Circuit of the Americas at the weekend.
BRAD PITT FILM TO TAKE F1 ‘ANOTHER DIMENSION’
A movie produced and starring Brad Pitt will take Formula 1 to “another dimension”, according to F1 CEO Stefano Domenicali.
Pitt is engaged in the early stages of producing a movie based on the F1 championship, in which he will also star. The film will be helmed by director Joseph Kosinski and producer Jerry Bruckheimer, who most recently collaborated on Top Gun: Maverick. Lewis Hamilton will also co-produce the movie.
Pitt, a dual Academy Award winner, was in the paddock during the United States Grand Prix weekend to have meetings with Formula 1 boss and team principals about standing up the project, and Domenicali has revealed that the sport will be more closely involved with the film than just advising or licensing its intellectual property.
“I think it‘s serious stuff,” Domenicali told Autosport.
“This is another step in the growth. We truly believe that it will enable F1 to be in another dimension that was not explored so deeply and so well until today.”
Pitt snubs Brundle in awkward exchange | 00:31
Domenicali said that production would take place during race weekends, with the actual teams and drivers being invited to participate.
“You will see a lot of things will happen next year on the preparation, and it‘s exciting because all the teams will be involved, the drivers, everyone,” he said.
“They will be there, the real [cars], that will be involved in the movie.
“We are already planning all the activity and the activation that needs to be done in a real race weekend, we‘re going to start in the second half of [2023] for the production.”
Domenicali also said that the film would profit the sport both directly and as a promotional tool, suggesting that the sport was preparing to branch out beyond Drive to Survive and into pure entertainment as it expands its global footprint.
“Movies will be part of what we‘re going to build for the future to attract a new audience and also to invest in extra revenue that will come,” he said.
It’s been hinted that the story will be based on a veteran racer returning to the sport to take on the next generation, with parallels drawn to the narrative of the newest Top Gun film.
FIA ABANDONS DUAL RACE DIRECTOR SET-UP AFTER JAPAN DEBACLE
Formula 1’s governing body has suspended the rotating race directorship it invented after sacking Michael Masi from the role during the off-season.
Niels Wittich will helm race control for the rest of the season, with Eduardo Freitas’s role unclear. They had previously shared the role, with one acting as director and the other as the deputy on a rotating basis.
Sainz spins out on lap one! | 00:32
Wittich and Freitas were both elevated to the position for this season despite neither having sat in F1 race control before.
In splitting the role the governing body was attempting to address failings brought to light by its own investigation into race control, which found Masi had been overworked, which had been the key contributor to the 2021 Abu Dhabi Grand Prix debacle.
But the Wittich-Freitas partnership has been characterised by frustration among teams and drivers that the sport was being administered inconsistently, and there have been several flashpoints throughout the season.
The most significant of those was the decision to deploy a truck and recovery tractor onto the wet circuit during the Japanese Grand Prix despite Pierre Gasly not yet being in position behind the safety car.
Visibility was so bad when the circuit vehicles were sent out that several drivers admitted to not seeing them as they crawled past at reduced speed.
Freitas was the race director in Japan, and drivers were particularly incensed by his decision-making given they had reportedly brought up the use of recovery vehicles on slick tracks just two days earlier during the Friday driver briefing.
A detailed investigation into the events that led to the vehicles entering the track revealed procedural problems the governing body will address with regulation changes next season, though the rotating race director role has been suspended as of last weekend’s United States Grand Prix, with Freitas no longer in charge of race control.
Drivers received the report positively, though they are set to discuss it in more detail at this weekend’s Mexico City Grand Prix after having had a week to digest the findings and recommendations.
The drivers are also known to be seeking greater consistency among the rotating stewards panel, although there appears to be little appetite among the FIA or the teams for a permanent delegation given the risk they may be perceived as being biased in the case a number of decisions go against any particular driver or team.
Alonso goes airborne in chaotic crash | 01:12
NORRIS ‘HEAVILY DOSED UP’ ON PAINKILLERS FOR COTA BUMPING
Lando Norris has revealed he was “heavily dosed up” on painkillers because on his drive to sixth at the United States Grand Prix.
Norris said he had been suffering from headaches throughout the weekend because of the severity of the bumps around the notoriously uneven Circuit of the Americas.
Bouncing has been a problem all year under these new rules, with cars running much lower the ground and with significantly stiffer suspension than they have in seasons past.
It’s tended to cause problems more often around street tracks, which are generally rougher than permanent circuits, but the Austin circuit owners have struggled to keep the tarmac smooth owing to shifting earth beneath the asphalt.
The worst parts of the track were resurfaced at the start of the year, but the problem has remained regardless, enough for Norris to need the help of pre-emptive pain relief to make it through the race.
“There was so much focus [in] the last 10 laps, especially on the track like this,” Norris said, per RacingNews365. ”There’s so many bumps.
“I was heavily dosed up on headache tablets because I struggled a lot with that this weekend because it‘s bumpy.“
“It‘s really not nice.
“I don‘t know if it’s better for us or worse for us than other cars, but it’s something I struggle a lot with.
“When I take the tablets it probably doesn‘t make a big difference in the end, but it’s something I struggle with so [it’s then] easy to make mistakes — so easy to lock up, so easy to spin.”
The FIA has implemented a maximum bouncing frequency this year to try to protect the drivers after widespread complaints about the severity of the impacts after the Azerbaijan Grand Prix, though this was more targeted at aerodynamic porpoising, which the teams have largely solved for themselves.
Norris will get some relief from the much smoother Autódromo Hermanos Rodríguez, host of this weekend’s Mexico City Grand Prix.
