Race for Glory: Audi vs. Lancia

I read the reviews before watching the film and therefore had zero expectations. We have all seen Jeremy Clarkson's story-telling masterclass on the Grand Tour. This is the film version and overall it was better than I was expecting. The cars are great and the story could have been told better I'm sure. Daniel Brühl was one of the draws for me as he had played Niki Lauda to perfection in "Rush" and I was left feeling his character could have been more intense and the rivalry with Cesare Fiorio could have been developed further. Some of the incidental music was age appropriate which was good. I felt Ron Howard (Director of Rush) could have done more with this story. Maybe he can do the Group B story up until Henri Toivonen crashed his Delta S4 in Corsica leading to the Group B ban and the subsequent development of Group A and the Lancia Delta Integrale which dominated and won 6 years in a row.

I'm surprised of the negative reactions to this film... I guess some of you haven't seen "Lamborghini - The Man Behind the Legend"! (spoiler: don't)

As someone who remembers when this WRC season happened and followed it, I also had the advantage of being able to watch Race for Glory in the original Italian. The acting is so-so, some of the dialogue clichéd, but the racing scenes are in my opinion better than average.

One surprise was, despite a glaring misstep with the homologation officers counting Beta Montecarlos instead of Rally 037s and not even noticing, there was some attention to detail, such as Fiorio driving around in a period-correct high spec Lancia Gamma and the FIAT politics at the time. There's even a cameo many will not notice: in the fleeting scene where you see the "Avvocato" Gianni Agnelli face on, the uncredited actor is actually Agnelli's grandson Lapo Elkann.

The movie is not so much about racing as of the figure of Cesare Fiorio. Seen in this context, it's a pretty good movie that even my wife enjoyed. Just remember, it's not a documentary and doesn't intend to be.

Race for Glory would've been amazing but I was truly disappointed at the final result. How could anyone take such an amazing story like the Lancia vs Audi rivalry and just gloss over the important bits like they were in a rush?

If you don't believe me when I say the story was glossed over, just see the first few minutes of the movie. It literally starts with a worded message of how Audi dominated the 1982 WRC season with its all-wheel drive Sport quattro. That's it. There was no build up for the main protagonist the movie sides with: Lancia. No mentions of Lancia's dominance from the 1970s before Audi. That's just lazy. If we were to side with Lancia in this film, you can't just not include their reputation from before like it doesn't have anything to do with the movie. It certainly does.

Also, I really hated how the movie treats Audi. There was a lack of screen time for Audi or even Daniel Bruhl's (Roland Gumpert) character. The only times when Bruhl was on screen was when Riccardo Scamarcio (Cesare Fiorio) was there to rial up tension between the two. That's the only rivalry we get. There's certainly way better ways to capture rivalries like this; for instance, Rush. What Rush did with the Hunt vs Lauda rivalry was amazing. They actually filmed both sides of the story, not just stick with one character and roll with it.

Lastly, pacing. You go from one race and then the next, you're back to interpersonal drama. For a racing movie like this, it's an insult. Again, another thing Rush did well was allocate a good bit of time to show the racing action. This movie with its hour and 40 minute run time seems to hurry the exciting bits of rallying so that we get more drama between Fiorio and his team.

Suffice to say, Race for Glory's adaptation of the actual story was lackluster. If I wanted to know what happened, I would've watched a documentary or even Jeremy Clarkson explain it in less time. And even if you weren't a fan of rallying, the film just doesn't cut it to give the audience the thrill of what made WRC legendary as it was back then. Yeah, some of the scenes of racing seemed alright, but it just wasn't enough to keep me glued to my seat.

As petrolhead, racing driver and journalist I always like cars and racing stories. But we are in era when films are made just to be made, and this one is the same. If you wan't viewers, you have to add drama, if you want drama, you need to make story up. It is great year for rallying, movie actualy contains some facts, but it has bad timing, bad directing, bad characters, poor acting and skips important events. When at the end for dramatic purposes somehow include 1985 Corsica event with fake driver, movie has it. There are better told documentaries, like Clarkson's. Movie to forget, unfortunately.

Watch,take it for it is but as a mediocre enthusiast this was below par. Knowing the story from previews when it was happening(and I was only ten) this is a sad attempt. An opportunity to tell a great story with a little more enthusiasm was lost. This could have been great,a little more investment would have made such a difference. But to take it for what it is,it's okay,but with all tge modern cgi it could've been so much better. I think it trys to take in so much detail from am an era that will be famous in motorsport forever,that it loses context.

Like I said earlier,an opportunity was lost,this could have been made in to a franchise,or at least a four part,with more detail character reference and action. There are true to life documentaries more entertaining than this to be be fair,it is nothing like the Shelby vs Ferrari movie. I'm disappointed, in this day and age a far more entertaining and engaging movie is not too much to ask for.