Michael Mann’s Ferrari is an exhilarating and horrifically haunting ride that emphasizes death’s perpetual shadow in a similar vein to Christopher Nolan’s Oppenheimer. It’s fitting that the two released in the same year while simultaneously a travesty because ties don’t exist amongst award contenders. Still, at the end of the day, while it’s a film that could’ve benefited from a longer run time, Ferrari is another bold success from Mann, full of some of the year’s best performances.
In more ways than one, Adam Driver drives (pun very much intended) the film to its impending crash, taking it from an audacious character study at a pinnacle point in a man’s life to an explosive spectacle. As the screenplay from Troy Kennedy Martin adapts from Brock Yates’s 1991 biography Enzo Ferrari: The Man, the Cars, the Races, the Machine, the film takes us inside a complicated man’s convoluted mindset as he grapples with his desires to constantly win and the harrowing grief that follows him around after losing his firstborn. It’s hard not to compare pieces of the two films when they deal with matters that dive into a man’s psyche and how he wrestles with his own creations resulting in death.
Compassion and empathy are limited in Ferrari’s life—there’s a stoicism that Driver carries that shows us we aren’t meant to sympathize with the historical figure, even when we feel for him. Grief is a puzzling darkness that takes everyone in different ways, but neither grief nor trauma is an excuse to shut off. And while we do get quiet moments where it seems there’s something tugging at the man’s brokenness and need for speed, they fumble with dramatization.
Further, alongside Driver, Penélope Cruz carries the emotional crux of the relationship alongside Driver, selling Laura Ferrari’s grief and haunting fury with such acute sadness that it’s almost always palpable. And it’s especially noticeable in a moment where there are absolutely no words because everything Cruz brings to life with her expressiveness showcases conversations many of us who know grief have had at cemeteries.
Still, while Cruz and Driver are fantastic, thoroughly so, it’s when Ferrari gets to the Mille Miglia crash that it feels like the action thriller it sets out to be. As significant as the relationships are in shaping the man, there’s little weight in the back-and-forth shifting of the gear, resulting in the turning point coming from known drivers other than Enzo himself. This could also be because Shailene Woodley is unfortunately miscast as Ferrari’s mistress and mother to his second son, Lina Lardi.
The final thirty minutes or so of the film cross the finish line most effectively, bringing to the silver screens something that even those who have no interest in racecar driving can feel the painstaking adrenaline and terrors of. (Like me.) Patrick Dempsey brings his A-game as Piero Taruffi, and Gabriel Leone dazzles as Alfonso de Portago. Sarah Gadon also brings a surprisingly fascinating performance as the first Bond girl, Linda Christian. Michael Mann’s Ferrari attempts to juggle many facets within its high-octane thrill ride, sometimes losing itself in the quiet moments when it should be thriving. Nevertheless, it’s a solid, stylishly developed film with a gripping narrative and performances that feel lived in.
Ferrari is now playing in theaters.