A brilliant display of car racing, mechanical design, and the will to win.

Rating: 8/10 (7 November 2019)

This is a great biopic that tells a compelling story between the American and Italian car makers in one of the toughest races in the world. As a person who likes cars and has a passing familiarity with Le Mans and car mechanics, I thought this move was excellent for people who only had a surface level knowledge of these things and had plenty for every type of movie goer.
Damon and Bale are obviously excellent, with Bale donning a proper English accent and lots of eccentricity and Damon pulling off the forced retired racer and now car designer smoothly. The supporting cast was extremely well done, with special call outs to Tracy Letts, who played an absolutely excellent Henry Ford II and had one of the best scenes in the entire movie. His ability to display such a wide range of emotions really sold the audience to how invested he was in this character. Caitriona Balfe as Mollie Miles, Bale's character's wife, was also excellent. She has a few of her own scenes where she steals the show and is the perfect compliment to Bale's character's own ad hoc lifestyle at times.
In fact, most of the scenes involving Ford Execs were so good that they warrant their own biopic with their own characters. The political battle between Ford's VPs was interesting and infuriating at the same time, showing repeatidly that they are their own worst enemy.
In terms of direction, this movie was executed well. Conscious decisions were made to have Italian dialogue not translated in certain scenes, allowing the audience really understand visually the scenes without giving it away. Most shots are very clean and the driving sections are well done to build tension while also not becoming boring.
The movie does throw a lot of you in terms of details, mentions of gearboxes, lift, brake roters, tire swaps, etc... all show that a proper gear head would enjoy the jargon. The Ford GT40 in general really shines here and takes center stage multiple times in the film. There is one particular scene where Damon's character take the car for a spin and you really do understand the absolute power behind the car and its eventual final designs that lead it to be successful.
At over 2.5 hours, this movie does not leave anything out and truly does tell the compelling story of the Americans at Le Mans. Overall the movie comes well recommend and is definitely worth a watch.