#18 Are You Still Watching? Vital Vroom Vroom Viewing 🏎️

Films to watch with—or instead of—Ferrari, from In The Mood's managing editor Sennah Yee

Vital Vroom Vroom Viewing

by Sennah Yee

Even though I’m named after Formula 1 driver Ayrton Senna, I haven’t done much to live up to my namesake—I can’t tell cars apart, I don’t have my driver’s license, and I don’t care if I’m dead last in Mario Kart (I often am). But last summer, I binged all five seasons of Formula 1: Drive to Survive on Netflix in two weeks and instantly became obsessed with F1.

Former F1-driver-turned-climate-activist (lol) Sebastian Vettel once said, “Everyone is a Ferrari fan. Even if they say they’re not, they’re Ferrari fans.” And he’s right, even though I only chose Ferrari’s Charles Leclerc as my favourite driver because he reminded me of Timothée Chalamet. Not to mention Leclerc looks sooo good in red, which happens to be both mine and his favourite colour since childhood. In the words of Enzo Ferrari himself, “Ask a child to draw a car, and certainly he will draw it red.”

When the algorithm fed me a video of Leclerc driving director Michael Mann around a Grand Prix track to promote Ferrari, as a new F1 girlie and longtime Mann Superfann, I ate up this smorgasbord of all my interests. Naturally, I went to see Ferrari opening week—and while I found it to be an absolute bore, when I got home I still pulled up an old F1 race to watch before bed, a new nightly ritual. It ended up being a rare race where Leclerc won, dominating in a beautiful matte red Ferrari car, dimpled smile on the podium.

So, for all you Ferrari fans out there (a.k.a. everyone), here’s my list of movies to watch with—or instead of—Ferrari:

Grand Prix (1966)

Spurs similar thoughts I have when watching a real Grand Prix: stunning race sequences revealing man-made and man-becoming machines, blood-red Ferrari propaganda, life and death and sex drives, and a tad too long—a real F1 race is usually two hours, this movie was three—perfect for nodding off a bit to the hum of nyoooooms. I was also delightfully surprised at the amount of time spent on the drivers’ WAGs (slang for athletes’ wives and girlfriends). I know the point was to show their concern for their beloved babes putting their lives at risk, but all I found myself thinking was oh, to be the best blasé bombshell basking in the paddock…