Gran Turismo - Review Thread

Gran Turismo is technically a video game adaptation, but not really. It’s actually more of a movie about a video game as it tells the true story of a guy named Jann Mardenborough who, after becoming an expert at that Playstation driving sim, won a contest to learn to become a real race car driver sponsored by Sony and Nissan. I’ve seen a surprising amount of hostility towards this movie on the internet as people seem to feel it’s being stuffed down their throat, but personally I’m pretty happy to see Hollywood trying to make pretty much anything that not a superhero or superhero-adjacent action movie so I was mostly open minded about it. Well, the final movie is decidedly “okay.” Let’s start with the good: Jann Mardenborough proves to be a pretty likable protagonist and much of his supporting cast including a coach played by David Harbour and his father played by Djimon Hounsou are pretty good as well. I was less fond of the contest creator/executive played by Orlando Bloom, but he could have been worse. I’d also say that the race scenes here are pretty well done. They aren’t mind blowing and there are a couple of gimmicky tricks they use that work better than others, but by and large they’re exciting to watch. What’s less successful is the movie’s script, which is hardly terrible but is certainly formulaic and leans into a number of lame sports movie clichés like the establishment of an evil rival racing team populated by rich teutonic snobs. I also suspect that it takes a lot of “creative license” with this true story and things just generally play out in ways that seem heightened and inauthentic. I might also suggest that the movie doesn’t ultimately have much to say about the character’s video gaming origins, once he’s become a real racer that seems to kind of be incidental to his life story and the movie doesn’t do much too really establish what makes him unique as a driver. So, this is hardly a must see, but sports movies are not particularly popular at the moment so I’m less sick of this formula than I am at certain other formulas that get thrown at us and if you’re in the mood for this sort of thing I do think this movie will scratch that itch effectively.