August 21, 2023
Marketing executive Danny Moore (Orlando Bloom) pitched an idea to his bosses in Nissan his idea to recruit the best players of Gran Turismo, a motorcar racing simulator game by Playstation, to become real-life competitive racecar drivers. Cognizant of the dangers this seemingly foolhardy plan involved, Moore had a hard time hiring a trainer, until ex-racecar driver, now mechanic, Jack Salter (David Harbour) agreed to take on the job.
One of the top scoring Gran Turismo players of the world invited to participate was Jann Mardenborough (Archie Madekwe), a university dropout from Cardiff, Wales. His father Steve (Djimon Hounsou) was particularly critical about Jann's obsession with Gran Turismo. He thought that this game could never help Jann achieve his dreams of becoming a real race car driver. However, Jann won his race and was admitted to the GT Academy to train.
Before anything else, the film paid tribute to Kazunori Yamauchi, the creator of Gran Turismo, and regaled on how the meticulous details of this game perfectly captured the experience of being racecar drivers. It was this conceit that led Danny Moore to come up with this wild idea aiming to boost the sales of Nissan cars. The Nissan bosses did not lose time agreeing to Moore's plan, and the film settled this backstory within the first five minutes.
The racing scenes edited together actual racecar footage with overhead scenes as from a Gran Turismo game. The rank of Jann's car was always labeled while it was running so we know how he was doing. If not that way, there were also labels in big letters that tell what lap it was already. It was also looked very good when images of racecars were being constructed and deconstructed around Jann in his bedroom or arcade playing his video game.
Archie Mardekwe may be a relatively new face, but his 6'4" height makes his Jann stand out from the crowd. From "Stranger Things" and "Black Widow," David Harbour can really portray these father figure characters like Jack Salter very well. Orlando Bloom looked much older since we last saw him in the last "Pirates of the Caribbean" film (2017). Djimon Hounsou portrayal was Jann's Dad was the film's emotional core. If you thought Jann's Mum looked familiar, she is none other than Ginger Spice herself, Geri Halliwell!
Overall, this film is, in essence, a typical sports movie, where an underdog candidate defied the odds to achieve his dreams. From the trailer alone, we practically know the whole story already. Nevertheless, there were still some shocking events that happen in between that kept things exciting. Its musical soundtrack, featuring Kenny G and Enya, provided some amusing moments. An additional plus was that this film by Neill Blomkamp was based on the story of the real Jann Mardenborough, the youngest GT Academy champ in 2011. 7/10
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