What I admired so much about Rush is its ability to take a topic (Formula One racing) and make it accessible to both fans and non-fans alike. Personally, I have zero interest in Formula One racing and I became completely absorbed in the culture thanks to the strength of Howard's direction and the script from Peter Morgan (Frost/Nixon, The Last King of Scotland.) Howard and Morgan paint a vivid picture of how cutthroat and difficult the circuit was at the time by examining every possible angle of the sport from the driver's relationship with the owners to the politics of determining whether or not to carry on with a race due to inclement weather. In a less-competent film, the scenes diving into the race culture would be just dead space to break up the race scenes, but here each scene showcasing the everyday grind of Formula One is just as exciting as the scenes on-the-track. Matching the intensity of the behind-the-scenes stuff, is the actual racing sequences. Each race sequence is brilliantly-shot and puts the audience in the middle of the action. You can feel every move that the driver's make on-the-track with crushing realism. Saying these scenes are exhilarating to watch would be a gross understatement, I can't recall the last time I was this captivated and blown away from the sheer convincing fury of something put on film.
The heart of Rush though lies in the rivalry between its two protagonists James Hunt (Chris Hemsworth) and Niki Lauda (Daniel Bruhl). Hunt and Lauda could not be any more different: Hunt is a hard-partying playboy who lives every day as his last while Lauda who lives by the book and is focused on nothing but racing, which wins him few friends and a whole lot of enemies. The one thing these two men share is the burning to desire to win and to never settle for anything less than being on-top of the sport. The friction and mutual respect they have for each other is an absolute pleasure to watch. Both Hemsworth and Bruhl get to the core of these real-life figures and deliver absolutely striking performances. Hemsworth gives Hunt so much charisma and brashness that you can completely understand why people either wanted to be around him constantly or wanted to punch him square in the face. His character is very arrogant, but there are certain scenes that require him to turn off the charm and handle serious business and Hemsworth proves up to the task by delivering pretty big emotional payoffs in these key scenes. Hemsworth, who is pretty much only known for his work as Thor in various Marvel films, shows with his performance here that his career will be alive and well once he hangs up the cape and hammer. The relatively unknown Bruhl shines just as bright, if not brighter than Hemsworth as Lauda. Bruhl captures the loner mentality of Lauda and paints a vivid picture of a man whose only goal in life was to be the best driver Formula One has ever seen. While Bruhl is great throughout, the scenes immediately after the crash at the German Grand Prix that left him severely burned and restricted to a hospital bed, are the most powerful in the whole film. Bruhl doesn't say much in these scenes because of his character's condition but his actions and (mostly) silent desire to get back on the track are awe-inspiring in their authenticity. Rush is a consistently engaging and exceptionally-made film bolstered by two outstanding performances that will hopefully gain some recognition come awards season.
4/5 Stars
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