Bale’s race to immortality

THRILLING action and touching human drama are finely balanced in this gloriously old-fashioned, 1960s-set racing movie.

The film (Ford vs Ferrari to US viewers) tells the true story of how grizzled Texan car designer Carroll Shelby (Matt Damon) and his Brummie driver best friend Ken Miles (a thin Christian Bale) helped American car giant Ford take on the dominant Italians in the world’s most famous 24-hour race.

On paper, this doesn’t tick any boxes of the underdog sports drama. But to director James Mangold (Walk The Line), the real villains aren’t the arrogant foreigners but the risk-averse corporate machine.

Here Shelby and Miles are no-nonsense gunslingers who must slug it out with the snivelling suits who pay their wages if they want to take the chequered flag.

When we meet this engaging double act, they have worked together for years and enjoy the salty banter of bickering brothers.

Miles, who moved to California after the war to start a motor racing career, is a talented engineer and driver but also his own worst enemy.

When Shelby agrees to help give Ford’s image a makeover, he knows his first battle will be to be persuade their marketing men to let the loose-lipped British maverick behind the wheel of the new GT40. Damon is acting well within his range but Bale has a lot of fun with the eccentric Miles who sings “I’m H-A-P-P-Y” as he overtakes rivals, and prefers steaming cuppas to magnums of champagne.

We also get to see his touching relationships with his adoring but worried son Peter (Noah Jupe) and his wife Molly (Caitriona Balfe) who, in a break with convention, fully supports his dangerous career.

Whenever the pace slackens, Mangold puts Bale in the driving seat. In the big races, his camera drinks in the grand old stands and the sleek vintage cars.

But when a flag is waved, the director’s preferred set-up is the dashboard camera.This gives us a sense of Le Mans as a death race where rain-lashed bends are taken at startling speeds.Thankfully, modern racing is lot safer. But the current image-conscious and tax-averse champions have nothing on Miles.