REVIEW: ‘Gran Turismo’ Review: A ride you won’t forget!
A popular video game gets adapted into a film about a young guy who trains to become a race car driver. Only one problem, he’s never set foot in a racecar.
The film “Gran Turismo” takes the classic video game of the same name and puts it up on the big screen. Based on a true story, it follows the journey of teenager Jann Mardenborough, a talented racecar gamer in the UK who lives a simple but mundane life. One day he gets asked to participate in a contest that will allow him to train at an actual racecar facility if he wins. After winning the contest he is brought over to the United States to an academy with nine other racecar gamers. They begin training for a chance to win a spot at becoming a professional real-life racecar driver.
The film stars Archie Uchena Madekwe as Jann, David Harbour as his dedicated mentor and friend, and Orlando Bloom as a marketing executive.
Despite some of its inaccuracies and dramatizations, it is somewhat close to the real events that occurred. It incorporates many true elements of Jann’s life, such as the fact that he was the youngest winner of the GT Academy at just 19 years old. In the film, there is a scene where Janns’s car crashes and kills a spectator. This is true and was an integral part of Jann’s career and life. In the film, Jann’s father is accurately portrayed as a successful soccer player for several decades, who helped Jann understand what he disliked and liked.
The film also includes cool game-like simulations in scenes where he is driving an actual racecar. In a scene where Jann is deciding what move to do next to win the race, video game selections appear on the screen. Jann is seeing everything through a video game lens. When time slows down in the film, we see how his brain processes which path is most successful. After leaving the training Academy, if Jann loses, the consequences are much more dangerous.
In the end, his differences make him unique and just as qualified as the rest of the racecar drivers. He proves that racecar video gamers can move on to racing cars in real-life if they’re good enough. With enough training and determination, racecar video gamers can see what racing on the real-life track is like: the feel of an actual racecar steering wheel, the adrenaline of driving over 200 miles per hour. The film did a great job at capturing all the complexities and intricacies of this real-life story.
The film has done surprisingly well and beat initial expectations as a video-game adaptation. It grossed over $110 million dollars worldwide since its initial release to theatres just a month ago. If you want to watch the film ‘Gran Turismo’ you can now view it on Amazon Prime for $24.99. It is projected to move to other streaming platforms in the coming months.
