ITALIAN MANUFACTURING BEAUTY

LAMBORGHINI PLAYED WITH GREAT IDEAS ALL HIS LIFE

By PETER THOMAS BUSCH

The Lamborghini 350 GT was not just fast but at the time of production the grand touring car may have been the most beautiful car from beautiful Italy.

Director Bobby Moresco blends two narratives to create a hybrid film based on the development of the Lamborghini brand in Lamborghini: The Man Behind the Legend (2022).

Romano Reggiani plays a young Ferruccio Lamborghini returning from World War II as the son of a grape farmer.

Initially, Lamborghini has the idea of entering a car race to raise funds for the production of a farm tractor. Lamborghini meets race organizer Enzo Ferrari, played by Gabriel Byrne, at the beginning of the race but the Lamborghini driving team never finishes.

Lamborghini then goes to a position of last resort and asks his father to mortgage the family farm so he can begin development of the tractor.

The tractor, at half the size with twice the strength, has a hybrid fuel cell with two independent gasoline tanks.

A recuring secondary narrative has the director’s camera following a street race between Lamborghini and Ferrari driving their respective brands.

Moresco uses close cropped camera shots to create for many scenes an historical image as if painting with his movie lens the proud portrait of a famous family for the national museum.

Personal tragedy soon strikes the rise of Lamborghini and the young car designer begins to channel his energies into the production of 1000 farm tractors.

Frank Grillo plays the older Lamborghini who gradually sets his sights on the development of a touring car to rival those produced by Ferrari.

Lamborghini is by now walking about with a full stride and looking for new projects before decidedly moving from farm tractors to sports cars.

Moresco continues to weave the one narrative of Lamborghini and Ferrari street racing in and out of the main narrative about how the ideas behind the brand were developed.

If nothing else, Lamborghini is fanatical about beauty and building beautiful machinery like the Lamborghini 350 GT in 1964. 

The film is shot in good light that one might find on a famous painting by a Renaissance artist and innovator.

And what is said about the motives behind mechanical engineering automobile innovation is more often than not worth listening to.

But what is missing is a few good subplots which becomes as noticeable as Ferrari needing a new clutch as the 1 hour and 37 minute runtime moves along like the world’s most expensive sports car disappearing in the distance.

The film hints at subplots and real poignant moments about the owner behind the brand, such as how he transitions as a father with his young son, but then the narrative quickly moves away from the personal details and back into the main narrative as time is running short to beat the competitors just across the street.

And the use of two different actors for Lamborghini instead of reaching out to the hair and makeup department is a questionable choice. The tone and atmosphere of the early scenes are significantly altered by the tragedy haunting the mechanical engineer especially after leaping forward in years and then starting part two with a different actor as the older car designer.

That overall vision does not quite work so well. And instead, in the end the biopic feels a bit like two separate film projects even when the finish line comes close and the narrative accelerates through flash backs to the earlier scenes of a younger life.

Scenes are driven with popular music of the time but also with the throaty sound of an Italian sports car engine.

Lamborghini: The Man Behind the Legend is streaming on AppleTV.