Did you know that in 2023 we had an extra fictional F1 team on the grid at Silverstone? Not a real team but part of a movie which stars Brad Pitt and how did they go? Well, one car didn't even get off the line, while the other one went just 400 metres before it turned left at the 1st corner and headed off to a runoff zone. So, does this movie have a title yet? No, it's just being referred to as the yet untitled Apple F1 movie and APX.
APX is the name of the Fictional team, which will race against the other teams, but only in the movie, and Silverstone was the first time that we've seen the film crew at a track. So did their cars race against any of the F1 cars at any stage? No. But they did race against themselves. They're out on track doing filming on several occasions, and these were at times when F1 wasn't running on track. Their cars were F2 cars with liveries that look very much like the HAAS livery of 2019. And who are the two star drivers for APX? Well, we've got Sunny Hayes as Brad Pitt Racing in the #7 car. Of course, Kimi was the last person that used number 7, and you've got Joshua Pierce played by Damson Idris, who's in the #9 car. And can you remember the last driver to use #9? I had to look it up. It was Nikita Mazepin.
Now, don't doubt that this is a huge step for Formula One. They've been very accommodating to the film crew allowing them to film both on track and in the paddock, they're giving them unequalled access. And all of the 20 F1 drivers will be part of the movie. Yes, Sonny and Joshua will be racing alongside all those 20 drivers.
Brad Pitt is a huge name, but also on board is Jerry Bruckheimer, known for the Top Gun series of movies. And there's no doubt that helped get this movie up with F1. So, what do we know about the plot? Well, while it's closely guarded, what we do know is that Brad Pitt will be playing Sonny Hayes, who's a former F1 racer who's previously had a horrible crash. But of course he returns to F1 to partner Joshua Pearce, played by Damson Indras, in the team APX. Of course, there are no Red Bull, they're more like a back of the grid team starting from last position and they've never won a point.
So how much input will the current F1 drivers have? Not a great deal. However, with their amazing access on the Friday night of the Silverstone race, Brad Pitt had been allowed into the drivers briefing. That's almost unheard of. The drivers were quite excited about it and you probably have seen Pierre Gasly's post with a picture of Brad and a couple of drivers in that driver's briefing. Is this the first time that we've seen Brad Pitt at an F1 race? No, he was at Austin last year and very popular, visiting a number of the drivers and teams. We'll see him a number of other times throughout the year as well, and I think we are in for a real treat.
So was this the first time that F1's been part of a movie? I believe yes (unless you count Rush), but it very nearly was the second time because going back to 2001 was a movie released by Sylvester Stallone called Driven. Now that movie could well have been about Formula One because in 1997 it was announced that Stallone had agreed a deal with Bernie Eccleston to base a film around the sport. Over those couple of years that ensued, Stallone was seen around the paddock conducting research, but the project never got off the ground, partly because the teams weren't happy about providing information to him. And then Bernie became concerned that if the film ended up being a bit of a shocker. It would tarnish F1's reputation and judging how Driven turned out, that was a shrewd move on Bernie's part.
So where were they in the pitlane? They were smack bang between Ferrari and Mercedes. They've been given a prime spot in the pit. Lane and the garage setup was every bit as good as some of the teams, maybe even better than some. When on track they had a lot of camera kit on the cars and they would drive on their own around the track with crowds in the stand on Friday and Saturday and film bits and pieces.
Did they have a hospitality motorhome? Yes. It was unlabelled and it was a lot smaller than everything else in the paddock, it was a mark stepped down from everybody else's, but it was somewhere for the crew to go and have a meal and be catered for when there was nothing happening.
Why do you think they picked Silverstone to do their first filming? Well, I think it's because the pit lane is unique. Most other tracks, you have garages, pit lane and a wall and maybe the wall is a metre or two or three metres wide. In Silverstone they have the luxury of many metres and its grass, so they could set up a lot of their camera kit out there on the other side of pit lane between the track and pit lane. By the way, it is also likely that Martin Brundle might even play a cameo role in the movie as a driver that Sonny raced against in the past. That's a clever move on the producers part because that would bring in a whole lot of genuine fans eager to see Martin in a movie.
Honestly, I think that every single person in Formula One will watch this movie and I think a lot of the fans will want to see how they treat our sport. Did you know that Lewis Hamilton has taken on a role as executive producer? He's providing a whole lot of expert advice. One thing I can tell you is that no team or driver will be depicted as a villain or in a bad light. All the rivalry takes place within the APX team. I can't wait to see the movie and 2025 is slated as a release year. Rest assured, this is going to be a very big movie when it comes to the sport and hats off to the people at F1 who have made this happen. They've obviously had to provide the film crew with a lot of access that previously has never been given to anyone else (maybe excluding Netflix for Drive to Survive) and as a result I think this movie will be one you don't want to miss.