Response #1

Response Paper #1

            The most recent movie that I watched was Rush, which was directed by Ron Howard. The movie follows two Formula 1 drivers, James Hunt and Niki Lauda, from their rookie years in 1970 all the way up to the 1976 Formula 1 season, and watches as a rivalry unfolds between the two drivers, who have very contrasting personalities. James Hunt is more obsessed with the fame, going out to party, do drugs, sleep with women, etc. His personality is also reflected in his racing style, as he will give the car 100% to either win the race or crash/blow up the car trying. On the other hand, Niki Lauda is more of the mechanical type. He knows his way around a race car; how to make it faster; He is the first one into the race shop and the last one out. Out on the track, he races very conservative, preferring to come home with the car in one piece rather than on the trailer with a DNF (Did Not Finish).

            The main event of the movie is the two drivers racing for the 1976 Formula 1 world championship. James Hunt, who had just bankrupted his previous race team, finds a ride at the last minute at McLaren, where he is the top contender to Niki Lauda, who won the 1975 championship with Ferrari. The two drivers are pretty much neck and neck in points up until the German Grand Prix. At the race, Lauda forces the racing committee and the drivers to cancel the race due to rain. However, his pleas fall on deaf ears, and the race goes on. In the race, Lauda crashes his car and is taken to the hospital. He ends up sitting out for 6 weeks while Hunt dominates and takes over the points lead. Lauda does eventually return to the car, and makes a serious run at the championship.

I can relate this movie to many different events that I’ve seen, where the person placed in that position can either choose to be aggressive or to be more conservative. For example, during my senior season of high school football, we had a really good team, and we often would be leading our opponents by 20 to 30 points at halftime. In these situations, our head coach was forced to make a choice between an aggressive approach and a conservative approach. If he went aggressive, our team would win by about 40 points or so, and we would get a huge jump in the rankings. However, he would risk losing his best players to injury by keeping them in the entire game. By going conservative, he could avoid losing his players by putting in the backups. We would still end up with a win, but we wouldn’t get as big a bump in rankings as we would if we destroyed our opponents.

I think that the main message the movie was trying to tell is that you are often presented with a choice of either going all-out for something or holding back a bit, maybe to keep yourself out of harm’s way. I like the way that the movie presents this choice by using racing, a topic I can really relate to.