Despite being a handsome period drama filled with witty black humour, Michael Mann's Ferrari 'pootles along', writes Nicholas Barber from the Venice Film Festival.
In 1957, Enzo and his wife, Laura, have built their company into a world-renowned brand, and one of the main employers in the town of Modena. But things aren't running as smoothly as they once did. Enzo and Laura haven't been happy since the death of their son from a kidney disease. Enzo, grey-haired and thick around the waist, prefers to steal away from their apartment and visit the country villa he shares with his mistress Lina and the young son that Laura doesn't know about.
To be fair, Troy Kennedy Martin's screenplay, adapted from a biography by Brock Yates, is studded with witty black humour and colourful exchanges. The film looks good, too. Mann has made a handsome period drama in which the screen is always filled with snappily dressed extras, attractive locations, and, inevitably, gleaming red vintage cars. But it feels less like a dynamic true-life thriller than a prestigious, watchable-but-all-too-leisurely television series.
Who knows? For all his legendary achievements, he comes across as a grumpy provincial middle manager. Cruz gets to clump around town scowling at people, but she doesn't convey what Laura thinks about the company she helps to run. And Jack O'Connell pops up as an English driver, Peter Collins, but he is given almost nothing to say except the immortal line,"Thank you, old bean." To put it in the most appropriate terms: it's hard to see what drives any of them.
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