If the latest Charley-and-Ewan mini-series isn’t doing it for you, or if you’ve already finished it, then fear not—you can check out this new documentary that just hit the digital market in the US today. Dakar: Race Against The Desert is now available on Apple TV, DirecTV, Amazon Prime, iTunes YouTube and a lot of the other places you rent or buy digital movies.
Here’s the official description of the 90-minute film from Universal:
Dakar: Race Against the Desert provides intimate and exhilarating access to the world’s toughest motorsport challenge. Through interconnected stories of grit, teamwork and determination we follow Dakar legends, Carlos Sainz Snr, Sébastien Loeb, Nassar Al-Attiya and Toby Price alongside the rally’s youngest stars Cristina Gutiérrez, Seth Quintero and Mason Klein as they push themselves and their vehicles to the limit. Dakar: Race Against the Desert redefines the audiovisual experience of this race, and documentary filmmaking, as we journey at break-neck speeds through the high-octane, unceasing action that is the Dakar motor rally.
Elsewhere, we see that the film combines race footage, including scenes shot in the cockpit. Supposedly there is little in the way of talking-heads footage, but let’s be realistic here. No matter how hard the filmmakers worked to keep a fast pace, the pot will only boil so hot when you realize that this is from the 2023 Dakar. A lot has happened in the last couple of years, and we already know who won the race. For hardcore fans, you can only create so much tension. And of course, this race does not solely focus on motorcycles. so the two-wheels-only crowd might get put off.
But for the rest of the world, this may be a great way to expose people to the wild world of rally raid, just as Dust To Glory shared the Baja 1000 with a much wider audience that had never previously heard of desert racing.
