Plot
A young hot shot driver is in the middle of a championship season and is coming apart at the seams. A former CART champion is called in to give him guidance.
Release Year: 2001
Rating: 4.2/10 (22,323 voted)
Critic's Score: 29/100
Director:
Renny Harlin
Stars: Sylvester Stallone, Kip Pardue, Til Schweiger
Storyline Talented rookie race-car driver Jimmy Bly has started losing his focus and begins to slip in the race rankings. It's no wonder, with the immense pressure being shoveled on him by his overly ambitious promoter brother as well as Bly's romance with his arch rival's girlfriend Sophia. With much riding on Bly, car owner Carl Henry brings former racing star Joe Tanto on board to help Bly. To drive Bly back to the top of the rankings, Tanto must first deal with the emotional scars left over from a tragic racing accident which nearly took his life.
Writers: Jan Skrentny, Neal Tabachnick
Cast: Sylvester Stallone
-
Joe Tanto
Burt Reynolds
-
Carl Henry
Kip Pardue
-
Jimmy Bly
Stacy Edwards
-
Lucretia Clan
Til Schweiger
-
Beau Brandenburg
Gina Gershon
-
Cathy Heguy
Estella Warren
-
Sophia Simone
Cristián de la Fuente
-
Memo Moreno
Brent Briscoe
-
Crusher
Robert Sean Leonard
-
Demille Bly
Verona Pooth
-
Nina
(as Verona Feldbusch)
Jasmin Wagner
-
Ingrid
(as Jasmine Wagner)
Chip Ganassi
-
Team Owner
John Della Penna
-
Team Manager
Dan Duran
-
Commentator #1
Filming Locations: Chicago Motor Speedway - 3301 S. Laramie Avenue, Cicero, Illinois, USA
Box Office Details
Budget: $72,000,000
(estimated)
Opening Weekend: $12,174,504
(USA)
(29 April 2001)
(2905 Screens)
Gross: $32,616,869
(USA)
(8 July 2001)
Technical Specs
Runtime:
Did You Know?
Trivia:
The original premier race of ChampCar on the Eurospeedway in Germany in 2001 was stopped after a crash in which Alex Zanardi lost both legs.
Goofs:
Continuity:
While performing the "coin trick", Tanto picks up coins with his left rear tire, but once he pulls into the pits all three coins are on the right rear tire.
Quotes: Joe Tanto:
I got will and I got faith. I believe you can will yourself in anything and do anything. And faith, that is like believing in something, man that's like having a good disease. It's contagious, if you hang around with people who have it you're gonna catch it, and its gonna change your attitude.
User Review
Man, I wanted this movie to be good...
Rating: 1/10
As a big auto racing fan, CART in particular, I awaited this movie since the
mid-90's when it was discussed as a Formula One movie. However, Formula One
wouldn't allow the access that it did for Grand Prix in 1966, so the
director defaulted to the North American CART series. CART allowed
unprecedented access to its venues, races, paddock, announcers, drivers,
sponsors, etc. But this movie fails in that it is nothing more than an auto
racing cliché. As a fan, it's hard to rebuff the blood sport aspect of the
sport to those who are not fans. The crashes are incredibly unrealistic,
some of the tracks are non-existent and the drivers are paper thin. The
scene near the swimming pool with the blonde vixen doing some sort of goofy
water aerobics is pathetic. The part where Jimmy Bly steals a car (that
happens to be filled with fuel indoors and doesn't need an external starter
to run) and drives it through the Chicago streets with Stalone in tow is
just ridiculous. And to they get arrested or even prosecuted for this
action? No, they just are forced to convey one of the stupidest dialogues
in the history of racing movies.
The CART series is in serious trouble in real life. A movie about the
excitement of the series, the strategy, the action and the pageantry of
racing could have boosted the series back to national respectability.
However, this movie just hinders its descent into oblivion with the Can-Am
series. It could have been so much more.
0