Ferrari

A Formula One driver – I believe it was the great Michael Schumacher – was asked if he ever thought about the risks. He replied that you just can't. If for one second you consider that you're traveling at 200 mph, strapped into a bathtub three inches above the ground and right next to a tank of rocket fuel, you'll never get in the car.

The same mentality applies in a pivotal early sequence in sporting biopic Ferrari. During testing, a car pinwheels across the sky, sending the driver ragdolling into the stands. It's a horrifying moment, but the only response of Enzo Ferrari (Driver) is to turn to aspiring young hotshot racer Alfonso de Portago (Leone) and tell him that a seat has opened up on the team.

It seems shockingly callous, but it's a necessary insight into the world of 1950s motorsports and especially into the mindset of Enzo Ferrari: Il Commendatore, the former racer whose glorious machines were the crown jewel of an Italy still recovering from war. But in 1957, Ferrari was on the brink of disaster. Enzo's beloved Scuderia Ferrari race team is hemorrhaging the little money the luxury production car division is bringing in, and he's getting sloppy about hiding his mistress, Lina Lardi (Woodley, convincingly captivating even as her frustration grows clearer), and their illegitimate son, Piero (Festinese), from his estranged wife and business partner, Laura Ferrari (Cruz, perfect as a brittle time bomb). At stake in all of this is the Ferrari name and who will bear it. The car? The company? Piero?

That Enzo seems so emotionally removed from all these concerns is absolutely the point of Michael Mann's brutally reduced adaptation of Brock Yates' definitive and encyclopedic English language biography, Enzo Ferrari: The Man and the Machine. As Enzo, Driver gets to once again tick the box to which every American actor aspires since The Godfather of performing in an Italian accent. True, he did so in House of Gucci, but the less said about that the better. Well, except as a point of contrast: The nuance and subtleties of Ferrari are everything that Ridley Scott's absurd cartoon was not. This time, Driver effortlessly navigates the complexities of the commercial and personal politics of the man and his relationships. Enzo's not always likable, but he is explicable, and that's vital both in his relationships and in how he handles the film's later pivotal crash: the jaw-dropping nightmare of the 1957 Mille Miglia, the road race that took lives and nearly destroyed Ferrari, which Mann captures with a suitably cool cruelty.

Mann has always been at his best when letting his actors reveal their characters through responses rather than exposition or even character development. The 59-year-old Enzo isn't going to change, and the real story is about his staidly fervent – some would say reckless – dedication to the success of everything that is Ferrari. As he sits in the family crypt, conversing with the shade of his dead first son, he makes it clear where his race will end. However, Mann's decision to restrict this portrait to such a limited time period may leave audiences a little dissatisfied that important events are only recounted, not depicted. But then, if you're on the most thrilling corner of a track, you may not see the finish line.