F1: The Movie

WOW. Absolutely blown away by F1: THE MOVIE, an old fashioned, perfect summer blockbuster that looks and sounds incredible in IMAX.

Jerry Bruckheimer has created the same magic he did so many summers ago with the opening music and visuals of "Top Gun" and "Days of Thunder". This time, he drops you into the world of F1 and behind the wheel of the fastest cars in the world. Filmed at the real F1 events around the globe, the film oozes class, drips money and thrills.

When I say that we were on the edge of our seats for all the races, I mean that literally. Director Joseph Kosinski (Top Gun: Maverick) delivers a flawless experience that exceeded my very high expectations.

Brad Pitt is a movie star, effortlessly charming, real and funny as driver Sonny Hayes. Talented, haunted by his past and lurking at the corners of Nascar and other race formats, he was at the top of his game in F1 when tragedy struck.

Former race team partner and great friend Ruben Cervantes (Javier Bardem, reaching his career peak in cool) approaches Sonny to join his last place F1 team. He's got a talented but very young emerging star in Joshua Pierce (Damson Idris) but needs a lead driver or he may lose his F1 team. Idris is a breakout star here and the perfect, funny and dramatic foil for Pitt's Sonny.

Cervantes has the only woman head engineer in the sport and luckily for us, Kate McKenna is played by Kerry Condon (The Banshees of Inisherin) in a great, unpredictable performance. Condon is a standout, as is Sarah Niles (Ted Lasso) as Pierce's mother, Bernadette.

This is old fashioned movie making, elevated by modern technology and a $200 million budget that fills every inch of the IMAX screen. Tiny cameras were inserted in the cars, allowing us to see Pitt and Idris driving the cars on the actual tracks and all the action going on around them. Drone cameras swoop through the action from dizzying heights above the tracks to a couple inches off the ground between the cars.

In IMAX, its one of the most stunning visual experiences I've had in a very long time.

I was already loving the movie and then we hit a pivotal early scene, with Sonny arriving to test drive the team's car design around the track. As Pitt straps in, Chris Stapleton's song "Bad As I Used To Be" pounds out of the IMAX system and Sonny speeds around the track trying to hit a lap time.

It's one of the best, perfectly set up, pure entertainment big screen moments since Kosinski's "Top Gun" Maverick" blew us away in theaters. Kosinski, Bruckheimer and Pitt are just getting started.

The characters are funny, good and evil. Competitive passions run high, creating some awesome high drama moments.

Pitt is back in Cliff Booth mode here, oozing the same "cool" as he did as the stuntman in "Once Upon A Time in Hollywood". He is fantastic from opening scene to final credits. We walked out asking, who of the current young male movie stars are primed to take the place of Brad Pitt and Tom Cruise as action film leads? We couldn't come up with anyone. There's a quality that Pitt has here that shares widescreen movie star DNA with Steve McQueen. This is his biggest payday as an actor, $30 million for the role. He's worth every penny.

This is one of Pitt's best films and continues to establish Kosinski as the go-to creator of mass appeal, traditional summer blockbusters. There's a huge difference here. It's one thing to come in and create a massive hit sequel to a known property like Top Gun.

What's even more impressive here is his creation of an entirely new story in the world of F1 racing. He has said they had 5000 hours of racing footage they shot, which he and his team have edited into this stunning experience.

I've never watched an F1 race. I've been close to one, checking into The Wynn Las Vegas the morning after the race, but the film MAKES me want to watch F1. Stunning. Speaking of The Wynn, its beautifully featured here in a sequence around the Las Vegas F1 race. The city looks fantastic, as does this stunning resort. It's the best ad for The Wynn I've ever seen. Kudos to their PR team.

A rare, absolutely perfect blend of thrilling action and human drama, F1 is the movie of the summer. Find an IMAX screen near you and buckle up, like the sold out, cheering crowd we saw it with, I was blown away. An A+ from this pit crew for the best racing movie ever made.

Based on all the folks we saw it with sporting F1 gear from their favorite team, this is going to be a massive hit and deservedly so.