There's a little bit of a petrolhead in all of us

Love The Beast
D: Eric Bana 2009

A documentary by an Aussie actor who’s a Hollywood star about his love for his first car doesn’t sound all that exciting does it? Unless you are a big Eric Bana fan or a revhead.
I’m essentially neither, having never seen Bana in anything except Chopper and having not owned a car for some years now (and being mechanically inept when I did own one.) That said though this is a great movie. Perhaps because I don’t see Bana as a Hollywood star I can quite happily accept him as a guy with a passion for cars, a guy who just happens to have access to Jay Leno, Jeremy Clarkson and Dr. Phil but also a guy who still gets together with his mates from childhood to play with their cars.
And really that is what this movie is about – passion. Whether its music, splatter movies, Jess Franco’s leading ladies, sports or yes, cars – everyone has a passion, something they love, truly love and will defend, collect, rave on about, watch, play, study… For Eric and his mates, it has always been cars and in Bana’s case his first car an XB Ford Falcon Coupe, bought for him by his father when he was just fifteen years old. As his mate Tony so eloquently puts it, “I’ve never met anyone who’s had a car for so long that’s been a heap of shit and been so in love with it.”
This film is all about that car “The Beast” and Bana’s plans to race it in the 2007 Targa Rally in Tasmania. Eleven years before, a younger and less famous Bana had raced there for the first time but now with the car completely stripped down and rebuilt he wants to do it all again. Along the way we are treated to the story of how he got the car, how his friends helped him to prepare it, we are given a look at the boy, the Melbourne suburbs he grew up in, the 65 T-Bird his father still keeps in the garage, refusing to get rid of it though it hasn’t been driven for ten years. There’s the mateship and bond that exists between Eric and his mates who despite their different lifestyles still get together when the beast calls.
And yes there are those special guest interviews. Leno shows off his aircraft hangar sized garage chock full of cars, Clarkson talks about how cars are more than just objects and Dr. Phil? Well, he is as irritating as ever. Doesn’t matter what the guy talks about, he’s a pain in the ass.
And then there is the race itself. Four days in, Bana crashed the beast into a tree, totalling the car but luckily not harming himself or his navigator Tony. Two days later Bana had to attend a red carpet premiere for a movie back in New York. In a great little scene he mocks the whole Hollywood scene before getting out there and doing what he has to do to promote a movie he only vaguely remembers making. Meanwhile his one true love sits in a garage, broken and bent and waiting for him to come home.

Bana has done a beautiful job with this doco, it could have quite easily just been a “look at me, aren’t I cool? I race cars and I act and I know all the stars” type thing but instead it’s just another guy and his mates, his family right behind him, trying to live a dream, trying to finish a race. The fact he does know a few famous folk helps get the interviews but its not played out as a ‘cool buddy’ thing – in fact Clarkson rags him about his car! This is purely about a bloke’s passions, about family and friends, about what is important to people. To some of us, it is our car, to some it’s owning every Beatles record ever made, for others its following a football team or a movie director, or playing guitar or collecting books – forget about Bana the actor for awhile and think of Eric Bana, revhead kid from the ‘burbs of Melbourne, Eric Bana rally driver, father, son, mate – that’s the guy in this documentary. Do that and you’ll enjoy the ride.