Film review: Let it rain Oscars! Because "Ford v Ferrari" is brilliant

One thing first: there are no spoilers in this review. You will only read what is known from the trailers that have already been released.

It's the 1960s. Ferrari is considered the measure of all things in motorsport. Especially in the 24 Hours of Le Mans, France, a race that was becoming increasingly popular in Europe. That's what makes Ferrari special. Because dominance in motorsport - that stands for engineering skill and reliability.

Something Ford does not stand for. In 1966, the car manufacturer's sales figures were in the basement. The brand is unsexy. Not in keeping with the times. Factories have to be closed and what's left of the once proud brand's reputation saved. Henry Ford II (Tracy Letts) and his head of marketing, Lee Iacocca (Jon Bernthal), decide on a plan that seems like a bad joke: to invest millions in a racing division to beat Ferrari at Le Mans.

But money alone doesn't win races. Expertise is needed. And the right driver. Enter Carroll Shelby (Matt Damon), winner of Le Mans in 1959 and now a racing car manufacturer, and Ken Miles (Christian Bale), one of the best drivers of our time, but also a choleric roughneck and loner. Together, they have 90 days to build a car that can beat the Scuderia from Italy.

Mangold, one of the most talented directors in Hollywood

Word should have got round that James Mangold is a damn good director. His credits include "Identity", a mystery thriller from 2003, the multiple Oscar-nominated "Walk the Line" starring Joaquin Phoenix two years later and the 2007 western "3:10 to Yuma". Most recently, he delivered one of the best comic book adaptations of all time with "Logan".

The man knows how to make good films.

However: I didn't see what "Ford v Ferrari" is about. A good film? When Matt Damon and Christian Bale play the leading roles and Mangold directs the film, the question doesn't arise. But the film isn't just good. It's brilliant. Brilliant because its 2 hours and 28 minutes run like a race. Brilliant because the glamour of racing in the 1960s is skilfully captured on screen without you necessarily having to know anything about it. But above all brilliant, because Mangold's direction tickles an acting performance out of everyone that can't help but be a feast.

The screenwriting brothers Jez and John-Henry Butterworth, whose best-known work to date is "Edge of Tomorrow", also ensure this. No, "Ford v Ferrari" is not as complex as the sci-fi blockbuster. And it doesn't have to be. The characters are too human, the conflicts too exciting and the story itself too crazy to be embellished with unnecessary chicanery.

Instead, they structure "Ford v Ferrari" as a simple three-act play that only comes up with a surprise at the end: The staging of the Le Mans 66 race as a film within a film, which itself becomes a three-act play with a beginning, middle and end.

Well, to do justice to the epic scale of a 24-hour race. Thanks to Mangold, this is also expressed in terms of craftsmanship: every camera shot makes you feel the sheer speed and rawness of motorsport. Day and night alternate twice. Again and again, we viewers sit in the Cockpit, feeling the wind and rain pressing us into our seats - how the car shakes with every gear that is engaged and how the slightest driving error that is made means almost certain death.

Mangold creates these warm images that epitomise the chic of the times and make one thing clear: Here, racing drivers accelerate to over 320 kilometres per hour - in the 1960s, a time when no one could be sure that the car would even brake at the end of the straight.

Great cinema

Without a doubt: Bale once again worthy of an Oscar

Christian Bale plays Ken Miles as a hothead who has petrol in his blood and his heart in the right place, but whose temper gets the better of him too often to build a career on his driving talent. The film is not told from Ken's point of view - the narrator is Damon's Caroll Shelby. But he is the engine that drives the film, humming along and shifting up a gear whenever the story briefly stutters.

More than that. He is unbridled, but fair to his opponents. He tells people bluntly what he thinks of them - often with a mischievous grin. An underdog, likeable despite everything, who has to learn to jump over his shadow and leave his pride behind him before his loose mouth deprives him of the fame he deserves.

This is an acting performance that should be rewarded with at least an Oscar nomination.

At his side is Matt Damon as visionary and dreamer Carroll Shelby. He is not an introverted antithesis to Miles. Rather, he is the strategist, the catalyst who transforms the British driver's rawness into pure racing fire on the track. Shelby is not one to mince his words. Time and again, he stands protectively in front of Miles. Quick-witted and prepared.

Because Henry Ford II - played with ingenious imperiousness by Tracy Letts - is the patron of a corporation with dozens of committees and tieflings who know nothing about racing and are constantly interfering. Internal squabbles and intrigues are the order of the day. They want to oust Miles, the bloodhound, from the driver's seat in order to replace him with bread-and-butter profiles who may fit in better with Ford's brand, but are no match for Miles in terms of driving skills.

Shelby holds his own. Time after time. It's as if you're watching a boxing match that goes 13 rounds - but you can't guess the end. Unless you check the history books before the film, of course.

There's the scene in which Shelby has to explain to the patron why a supposed defeat on the track is a victory after all. "This isn't the first time Ford Motor has gone to war," says Henry Ford II, alluding to Ford Motor's importance to America during the Second World War, "go ahead, Carol. Go to war."

You have to have seen the scene yourself to believe that I was cheering in the cinema.

Conclusion: film of the year for me

Perhaps it's the surpassed expectations that make me celebrate "Ford v Ferrari" so much. But the film has earned all the praise it will get - and it will. In fact, the story is incredibly exciting, funny and tragic at the same time. A trademark of James Mangold's narrative repertoire.

But it is the chemistry between Bale and Damon that makes "Ford v Ferrari" something very special. Then there are the superbly staged races and that final third, which brings me closer to the fascination of Le Mans than I ever thought possible.

Honestly people, give this film an Oscar. Any one of them. Or even two.

"Ford v Ferrari" opens in German-speaking Switzerland, Germany and Ticino on 14 November 2019 - here in Switzerland under the name "Le Mans 66". In French-speaking Switzerland, it will start on 13 November 2019.