Movie Review: Rush
In “Rush”, the new sports movie written by Peter Morgan, directed by Ron Howard, there is a civilized, almost courteous sense of urgency.
For a movie that’s more or less about torque-ridden Formula One tracks and two dissimilar, celebrated, drivers – both wild in their own domains – this is a spectacular contradiction in terms.
Mr. Morgan is the writer of “Frost/Nixon”, also directed by Mr. Howard, and his last movie on this particular sport was the one of his directorial debut (“Grand Theft Auto” in 1977, no relation to the game). Since then, Mr. Howard has been moving from genre to genre, with one peculiarity fixed to his films – they were less about spectacle, and more about the people.
Now, it is arguable that almost all sports movies are about people – and yes they are, and following conventions, they are mostly about delectably flawed underdogs. Here in “Rush”, the drama is the estranged bromance between James Hunt (Chris Hemsworth) and Niki Lauda (Daniel Bruhl), and being the underdog is the least of their concerns after, say, the first thirty minutes.
Mr. Hemsworth as the dashing, notorious Englishman Hunt is a wild-child, whose first real entry – other than two and a half minute introduction at the race track – is the one where he is walks barefoot into a hospital with a nasty nosebleed, and quickly undresses the nurse. This is Hunt’s invariable persona, and his seduction – of both the women, and the camera – brilliantly balances Mr. Bruhl’s reserved and standoffish Austrian.
Hunts conquests, which includes a short-run marriage to model Suzy Miller (Olivia Wilde, in swanky pointed hats), is of little significance; but I suppose Hunt shares the gist of the film’s title more than Lauda, who initially starts off as someone we don’t particularly like, and ends up taking our concentration away from Hunt – and Mr. Hemsworth’s handsomeness – when we least expect it.
The transition is smooth, and Hunt doesn’t mind this at all, because Mr. Howards direction and the screenplay, doesn’t make them enemies. Their relationship is of a push-and-pull mechanism – a lever system that winds them up in tandem and in the interim keeps our focus locked in first gear.
However, unlike the title, Mr. Howard takes his time getting to the climatic run in the dangerously water-and-wind gushed Japanese Grand Prix of 1976. Both he and cinematographer Anthony Dod Mantle, do give more time to the densely color-saturated racing circuit than Hunt’s party-boy philandering, the races themselves – fueled by unnerving close-ups of the actors, with whipping lashes – feel like a secondary romance. They are forceful, violent, and yet, like those brief flirtations, die out quite abruptly.
But “Rush”, like I said, has better things in mind…like maybe, say, a golden globe nomination (the Oscars are a longshot here); it may not win, but from what I understand of Lauda and Hunt, it is about beating the challenge and getting there.
Starring: Chris Hemsworth, Daniel Brühl, Olivia Wilde, Alexandra Maria Lara, Pierfrancesco Favino.
Directed by Ron Howard; Produced by Mr. Howard, Brian Grazer, Andrew Eaton, Eric Fellner, Brian Oliver, Guy East, Nigel Sinclair, Tobin Armbrust, Tim Bevan, Tyler Thompson and Todd Hallowell; Screenplay by Peter Morgan; Cinematography by Anthony Dod Mantle; Editing by Daniel P. Hanley, Mike Hill with Music by Hans Zimmer.
Released by Universal, “Rush” is rated R for some bare-bodies, violent deaths in car crashes.