Brad Pitt stars this week in a sufficiently loud homage to the race track. Meanwhile, Allison Williams is rebuilding a killer robot while debut filmmaker Eva Victor offers something quieter — and more poignant — in Sorry, Baby. Here's what's new in theaters this weekend.
F1
In theaters and IMAX Friday
Filmmaker Joseph Kosinski, the guy who jump started post-pandemic summer movie-going three years ago with Top Gun: Maverick, trades in his fighter jets for Formula One race cars in the racing epic F1. Brad Pitt's in the driver's seat, there are fresh camera tricks designed to put you in the car with him, and there's definitely a formula, delivered by folks who know how to make it pop and sizzle.
Pitt plays old-timer Sonny Hayes, relaxed, laconic, iconic, and happy to let F1 team owner Javier Bardem badger him into coming back to Formula One racing after a near-fatal accident and three decades away. After trading quips with cocky rookie Joshua (a bristling Damson Idris) they're off to London, Monaco, Las Vegas and Abu Dhabi. Sonny wrecks a few cars — actually, everybody wrecks a few cars — as a tech team armed with computer simulation programs tries to figure out how to shave tenths of a second off race times. There's urgent chatter about warm tires and notes on screen saying things like "Lap 14," as if that matters. And the team's design expert, played tartly by Kerry Condon, is ever on-hand to remind Sonny what's important.
Kosinski makes the racing sequences exciting enough that you'll likely forget on occasion that F1's plot shares significant DNA with the plot of Pixar's Cars. And with screenwriter Ehren Kruger, he's made sure there's a bit of social significance behind the fun. Though the filmmakers don't make a big deal of it, Joshua is one of two black drivers in this fictionalized world, the other being Lewis Hamilton, who is Formula One's first and only black driver in the real world. Hamilton plays himself (he's also listed as a producer), and exchanges a knowing look with Joshua before one race. It's a nicely understated nod to how a potential blockbuster might just help diversify the sport to which he's devoted his life. —Bob Mondello
M3GAN 2.0
In theaters Friday
This trailer includes instances of vulgar language.
The problem with M3GAN 2.0, the sequel to 2022's surprise hit/meme-generator about a killer robot, is that its title denotes something that the film's audience wants, but that the film's characters really, really don't. "M3GAN 2.0," after all, promises the audience that M3GAN, the artificial companion created and ultimately destroyed by workaholic roboticist Gemma in the first film, is gonna get rebuilt. Thing is: Gemma (Allison Williams) doesn't wanna rebuild M3GAN. She spends roughly the first half-hour refusing to do the very thing that we all know she's eventually gonna do. In the meantime, the script throws so many superfluous plot threads at us (a rogue robot named AMELIA! The FBI! Not one but two tech bros! Mother-daughter angst!) that when M3GAN finally does show up, she has to fight for screen time. Eventually, though, the sequel delivers on the promise — and the premise — of the original, and retains the original's pleasantly schlocky, B-movie vibe. —Glen Weldon
Sorry, Baby
In limited theaters Friday
Early in her career, Eva Victor was an editor at Reductress, the satirical feminist site that's published pieces with headlines like, "'Most women lie about rape,' says man lying about rape." Their wry and thoughtful feature debut Sorry, Baby lives in that same emotional space, where trauma and humor perform a delicate duet. In addition to writing and directing, Victor (who uses they/she pronouns) plays Agnes, an English professor teaching at the same small and quaint New England school where she earned her graduate degree. After something referred to as the "bad thing" occurs, Agnes confronts the emotional fallout, but also finds comfort and solace in her best friend, played by Naomi Ackie, and a new neighbor, played by Lucas Hedges. This is the kind of film that sneaks up on you, funny when least expected and affecting without being cloying. And it officially announces the arrival of Victor as a performer and filmmaker to keep on your radar. —Aisha Harris
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