November 10, 2019

VANESSA A. BALBUENA

France’s legendary Le Mans race, the central contest depicted in James Mangold’s “Ford v Ferrari,” runs more than 3,000 miles over the course of 24 hours. But that’s nothing compared to the distance Christian Bale had to cover coming off playing Dick Cheney in “Vice.”

“When I first signed up for it, Jim said, ‘This is great, we’ve got six months until we start. Christian weighs 240 pounds,’” recalls Matt Damon. “I was like, ‘He weighs what?’”

Bale, sitting next to his co-star, lights up. “He’s rolling down the track!” Bale says, laughing. “Without a car!”

“I would just get these periodic updates. But he did it,” says Damon, shaking his head. “When I saw him on set, I said, ‘How did you lose 70 pounds?’And he just said, ‘Didn’t eat.’”

In “Ford v Ferrari,” Damon plays visionary automotive designer Carroll Shelby and Bale plays maverick British racer Ken Miles. Shelby and Miles were brought together by the Ford Motor Co. to defeat perennial Le Mans champions Ferrari in 1966. They are both dedicated, driven personalities who chafe at the dictates of the overlords at Ford. “Ford v Ferrari,” a rare big-budget original film, is about highspeed mavericks shrugging off corporate control to accomplish something singular.

For its two movie stars, it’s a story not so unlike the battles of getting movies — movies like “Ford v Ferrari” — made in today’s Hollywood.

“The parallels to the movie business, they were pretty easy for all of us to see,” says Damon. “Shelby and Ken needed Ford. They weren’t going to get anywhere without Ford, and they knew it. And Ford needed them. That’s the movie business. There’s always that tension.”

“There should be,” adds Bale. “There has to be that tension in order to create something wonderful. There’s got to be love for something and there’s got to be a certain amount of hate for it as well. I think both sides understand, ‘Hey, we can’t do it without them. And they can’t do that without us.’”

entertainment@thefreeman.ph