Sunday, November 4, 2007

Movie Review: Grand Prix

Here is a movie that is worth seeing: Grand Prix, from 1966, and about the Formula 1 racing business mainly in Europe. (Wikipedia)

The first 10 min of the film is the best, it is the race inside Monaco, and the split screens they use to enhance the effects of shapes and speed are great. The cinematography is just amazing and must have been groundbreaking 40 years ago. It won 3 Oscars, even if the plot is kind of simple. It is really all about the cars and men's minds :) I have to admit I fell asleep halfway through it, but it was because I was tired, not because the movie was boring. I'll let PP give his review in the comments!

Oh, and Yves Montand is playing the French driver for Ferrari. Ahhhhh! He was such a bad driver that he had a stand-in for all driving scenes (check out the Special Features at the end of the DVD, worth seeing!).

5 comments:

PP said...

You can watch the title sequence here:


http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ovzFXnIXWlM

sorry you will have to cut and paste the link..I don't have my cheat sheet for the HTML anymore

O.K. said...

Toshiro Mifune! (It says he has a part in the film in the titles PP posted.) What is a samurai doing in a racing movie? Perhaps he slashed the competition's tires with his katana?

PP said...

I don't know who Toshiro is...but one key story in the film is about the Japanese team(it is really about Honda, but it is never stated explicitly) so he must be one of the guys on that team.

O.K. said...

Mifume played the role of a samurai many times, most notable in Kurosawa's "Yojimbo".

O.K. said...

I must add it is a great poster for the film.