The buzz surrounding Rush has risen to a roar. Is Ron Howard’s new movie about Hunt, Lauda, and the epic 1976 F1 season worthy of the hype? 

Rush had its premiere in London on September 2 and was shown at the Toronto Film Festival this past Sunday night—to rave reviews, as they say. The American public will get a crack at the movie with the general theatrical release on September 13. And then we will all have the opportunity to learn what the furor is about.  

For what it’s worth, which may be a little or a lot (what do we know about show biz?) the industry paper Variety called Rush “not just one of the great racing movies of all time, but a virtuoso feat of filmmaking in its own right.”  Other reviews have been similarly gushing. Gearheads remain enthusiastic and excited—yet skeptical and guarded. We want to like Rush, we really do, but we’ve heard this before. We are carefully managing our expectations.

Here’s the thing: Rush could turn out to be the finest racing movie ever made, and still be a fairly awful movie. For films of this genre, the bar is that low. We’ll just have to watch and see.

Below is a little three-minute film about the making of Rush, featuring filmmaker Ron Howard. In case you haven’t seen it already, here he outlines a bit of his thinking about how and why he made the movie. Directly below it you will find the theatrical trailer. We’ll see you are the movies.

The Rush theatrical trailer: