Picoreview: Rush: does what it says on the tin.
Actually, it does more than that. It’s a very, very good movie, and this from someone who hasn’t got two sh…akes…to give when it comes to car racing.
Chris Hemsworth plays more or less to type as a big, likeable jackass; Daniel Brühl, whom I haven’t seen before and therefore couldn’t be playing to type, was not especially likeable but wasn’t supposed to be, either. If there was a flaw, it was that I didn’t feel the instant and profound antagonism between the two characters strongly enough, although I think the film tried to sell it. I just didn’t feel it strongly enough. They were too much two sides of a coin, I think; from the outsider’s viewpoint, their similarities bound them together so strongly that all I could see was the connection, not the hatred. (Rivalry, yes, absolutely: that was visible in spades, but there’s supposed to be hatred in there too, and I just didn’t feel it.)
But: the rivalry was extremely well sold, and their relationships with each other and the women (particularly) in their lives was very well done. It’s the opposite of a buddy film, and I really *enjoyed* their interactions and their different approaches to, well, everything.
Furthermore, I thought I knew where the movie ended. It turned out I more knew where it middled, which meant the last third or so was pretty white-knuckled. (So, actually, was the bit I knew about.) The filmography for the races is terrific, the costuming is good, the *lighting* is good: filters or whatever, but much of it carries a 1970s film look to it, which I appreciated.
In fact, there were moments where the 1970s of it was almost disconcerting: during one of the races, there’s a copse of trees in the way of the track view, and there’s a breathless moment where the commentators can’t see and can’t report, which in today’s multi-media-many-cameras-etc world is pretty well inconceivable. Kind of a surprising reminder, like.
Anyway, the reviews are in general very good and there’s a reason for that: it’s a good movie. Even if you don’t give a damn about car racing, it’s well worth going to see.