This year’s zippy The Super Mario Bros. Movie aside, video games have historically yielded less-than-satisfactory film adaptations. For the most part, they range from forgettable (Assassin’s Creed) to regrettable (Uncharted), the storytelling never quite capturing the thrill of actually interacting with a game.
Perhaps that’s why Gran Turismo—a new film based on a PlayStation racing franchise that began in 1997—seems so eager to define itself as anything but a game adaptation. Featuring dialogue that repeatedly reminds the audience that its source material is a “racing simulator,” the film positions the game as merely a narrative framework for a more intimate story. The movie is not about the game per se, but is instead based on the story of a real-life gamer: Jann Mardenborough, a teenager who became a professional driver after years of honing his skills on his PlayStation. The result is a mishmash of subgenres that, surprisingly, works.
Sure, the film is still a brand-extension exercise: There are close-ups of fancy logos (Porsche! Moët & Chandon! TAG Heuer!) as well as Orlando Bloom playing a Nissan executive who launches the program that recruits gamers to drive real cars. But its overall presentation is humbler than one might expect. The film does not appear to be setting up sequels through cliffhangers, or spin-offs through its characters. It doesn’t transform races into over-the-top, gravity-defying set pieces—the sight of vehicles kept literally on the ground might feel refreshing to anyone who’s watched Fast X.
Instead, Gran Turismo adds an intriguing twist to the classic underdog sports tale. Jann (played by Archie Madekwe) is a racer whose strongest asset in a life-threatening sport is his understanding of a video game. The film illustrates this using a neat effect: When on a real track, he envisions the path before him as a digital outline. When traveling at actual high-octane speeds, he imagines sitting in front of his console, helmetless and ensconced in his bedroom. Sports dramas usually feature a hero passionately transforming themselves, physically and emotionally, into a contender. In Jann’s case, training also means learning to see his sport as more than a series of predictable inputs.
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Helping him is a former professional racer and grizzled father figure named Jack Salter (Stranger Things’ David Harbour), a character invented for the film. Jack lends gravity to an otherwise mostly conventional mentor-mentee relationship; he is haunted by how thin the line between confidence and cockiness can be in the sport. Through his bond with Jann, the film lightly interrogates why anyone would want to strap themselves into an automobile hurtling down a closed loop at breakneck speed.
But not for too long, because, oh, those cars! The real stars of Gran Turismo are the vehicles—sleek steel marvels captured lovingly by the director, Neill Blomkamp, who seems to prefer filming machines to flesh-and-blood characters. He indulges in seat-rattling sound, sweeping drone shots, and immersive camerawork to place the viewer on the asphalt alongside Jann. The point of these kinetic, stylish sequences is not just to sell the cars; they convey the excitement and danger inherent to motorsports. The images of drivers rushing into frame, vehicles sliding within inches of one another, are genuinely scary. And a scene of Jann crashing off course and accidentally killing a spectator—a real-life incident that occurred in 2015—is particularly visceral to watch.
The cars are, in fact, more memorable than most of the characters—but that’s okay. Gran Turismo is satisfyingly simple, its ensemble an embodiment of well-worn tropes: the underdog, the jaded coach, the parents who struggle to accept their wunderkind son’s dreams. There are perhaps too many subplots—Jann has a love interest as well as a series of interchangeable rivals, most of whom become allies kind of out of nowhere—but the film is essentially cinematic comfort food. Every clichéd motivational line of dialogue and thinly drawn supporting character reassures the viewer that Jann, despite hazards and tragedy, is headed for success. That’s not a spoiler: Gran Turismo telegraphs its feel-good finish from the starting line.
In that sense, the film reminded me not just of video-game adaptations, sports biopics, and racing thrillers, but of coming-of-age movies—The Karate Kid rather than Le Mans. As I watched Gran Turismo, I was also surprised that I hadn’t seen something like it in some time: a summer crowd-pleaser that uses a splashy backdrop to tell a familiar but enjoyably emotional story. In an ever-expanding field of blockbusters trying to outdo one another in stunts, stakes, and silliness, a movie that hums along so inoffensively can feel like a luxury.
