Driver and Mann compliment each other beautifully in Ferrari

“Ordinary people under extraordinary pressure, Mike. What the hell did you expect? Grace and consistency?”

This line, delivered by Al Pacino in conversation with Christopher Plummer in The Insider, is the summation of Michael Mann’s career. 

The Chicago filmmaker has given the world timeless classics such as Heat and Last Of The Mohicans and cult hits such as Manhunter and Miami Vice, and when cinema needed him the most, he returned.

Ferrari is the latest film from Mann, his first film since 2015’s hacker thriller Blackhat, and within 5 minutes of Ferrari starting it feels like he never left.

Adam Driver is the latest actor to give himself over to Mann, and in the style of previous leading men like Day-Lewis, Pacino, Crowe, and Caan, he fully vanishes into the leading role. 

Driver is a chameleon, able to mix it up in big franchises such as Star Wars or European arthouse oddities like Annette, and this versatility makes Driver the ideal leading man.

There are few things better than seeing a great actor mesh so well with a great director, and Ferrari showcases both men’s talents. 

The story itself is fairly straightforward; the audience is informed that the Ferrari brand is strong but is in financial trouble, and the tension of the film revolves around the Ferrari team putting in a strong performance at the 1957 Mille Miglia.

As opposed to a conventional birth-to-death biopic, Ferrari zeroes on in a particular part of the man’s life and the people surrounding him.

Ferrari is a Mann movie through and through; a man builds a wall around himself in order to achieve greatness.

The beauty of any Michael Mann movie is the attention to detail and the care and craft put into the sound design.

It is a shame that this film is getting a relatively limited cinema release because seeing this at home will not do the film justice. 

The roar of the engine or the beautiful landscape shots cannot be replicated on television at home. 

One stirring sequence sees an exciting night race, and the deep blacks mixing with the shimmering headlights is classic Mann.

Action is Mann’s strong suit – for god sake, the man directed Heat! – and the car racing action in Ferrari is exhilarating.

When the film steers away from the melodrama and becomes a thriller with beautiful Italian racing cars, it really sings.

In one great scene, Ferrari becomes annoyed that one of his drivers and his Hollywood girlfriend are stealing the attention from the cars themselves.

Ferrari opts to bring the pair in for a photo, but makes sure the Ferrari logo is prominently displayed.

Italian culture is naturally well-suited to being depicted on the big screen, we know this from the films of Fellini or Sorrentino, and there is a simple joy in seeing Italian fashion, food, drink and motors given the Michael Mann treatment. 

In still photos, Adam Driver looks more like Giovanni Trappatoni than Enzo Ferrari, but in motion, you are sucked into the reality of the movie.

Driver’s performance is all about the subtleties, a raised hand gesture here, a tilt of the head there, and fans of House Of Gucci will be glad to hear that Driver has drastically improved his comedy Italian accent.

Ferrari is an interesting companion piece to Ridley Scott’s Napoleon, which also sees an esteemed director and actor team up to explore what makes one of Europe’s most famous men tick.

Penelope Cruz is wonderful as Ferrari’s wife, Laura, and she walks the very fine line between steely-eyed and soap opera villain. 

In scenes where Driver and Cruz go one-on-one, there is a crackling energy, a sense that either will explode at any moment. 

Cruz plays Laura as if she is playing one of her Pedro Almodóvar characters, and it works an absolute treat here.

If Ferrari has a weak point, it’s the casting of Shailene Woodley as Lina Lardi, Ferrari’s mistress.

In a film where the rest of the actors are dedicated to trying and largely succeeding at Italian accents, Woodley has the bold idea of simply giving up on doing an accent and speaking in her natural American one. 

Woodley is usually a reliable actress, but her off-brand energy detracts from the rest of the film.

For a director as obsessed with details as Mann, it seems like a major oversight to not have one of the characters speak in the same accent as everyone else, or at least try to match the energy of the people surrounding her.

Daniel Pemberton’s score is also fairly anonymous which is a major shame, as his recent work such as Across The Spider-Verse or See How They Run helps elevate those films.

There is nothing to suggest here that this is the same Daniel Pemberton who turns mediocre films into decent ones on the strength of his score alone, and in this case, the score just blends into the background.

Despite these fairly major issues, there is a lot to love with Ferrari.

Ferrari is very comfortably a top 5 Mann film, and while it’s just short of Heat, The Insider and Manhunter, it’s on a par with Last Of The Mohicans and Collateral.

 Like pretty much every Mann movie, this is a movie that will improve on rewatches and will develop a very healthy fandom over the years.

Ferrari has the soul of a movie that you will catch the man in your life watching while standing up in the living room, and he will protest “I just want to watch a bit of this!”

Welcome back, Mr. Mann – next time, don’t stay away for so long.