Adam Driver slammed by both critics and cinema-goers for his ‘absolutely awful Italian accent’ in new film Ferrari after viewers claimed movie sent them to sleep

Adam Driver has been slammed for his ‘absolutely awful Italian accent’ in his new film Ferrari.

Despite him receiving a seven-minute 30 second standing ovation at Venice Film Festival in September, the actor’s movie didn’t go down so well with critics and viewers alike, who called the American actor’s European lilt into question.

Adam, 39, takes on the titular race car icon in Michael Mann’s biopic about Enzo Ferrari, the Italian founder of the car manufacturer.

Screen star Adam has had practice at putting on an Italian accent before having played Maurizio Gucci in 2021 film House of Gucci, when he was also criticised for the unconvincing way he spoke.

But it seems he still has a way to go when it comes to impressing some movie fans, with one person writing on Twitter after watching the movie: ‘#ferrari is a disappointment. I did not have any expectations going into this movie, but I still ended up disappointed. The film follows the life of Enzo Ferrari, played by Adam Driver, who has an absolutely awful Italian accent. The only saving grace of this movie is the driving.’

Someone else wrote: ‘Adam Driver with an Italian accent sounds so funny I can’t take him seriously,’ while another cinema-goer posted: ‘I need whoever approved Adam Driver and Shailene Woodley’s Italian accent to be fired expeditiously’

Another amused viewer posted: ‘The Adam Driver Italian accent in the Ferrari movie is hilarious.’

While someone else wrote: ‘It’s very funny that some of our greatest living directors look at Adam Driver and go “I am going to cast you as a guy with a cartoonishly Italian accent”. I guess he kind of is the Al Pacino of this generation, who kept getting cast as a Cuban guy in the 80s.’

And another person joked: ‘Would be funny if every director who worked with Adam Driver started insisting he do an Italian accent in all of his roles for no reason.’

Someone else wrote: ‘It’s extremely funny that they’re making Adam Driver do an Italian accent again,’ while another viewer commented: ‘Adam Driver is good in the movie, though he is not served well by doing a bad Italian accent as well.’

Film critics also took not of Adam’s effort at an Italian accent, with John Bleasdale of BFI writing: ‘Driver is too young to play Ferrari and the hair and paunch are as unconvincing as that Italian accent which he only got away with in Ridley Scott’s House of Gucci, because we all thought it was a joke.’

Meanwhile, Maureen Lee Lenker of Entertainment Weekly was critical of other members of the cast too, writing: ‘The dialect work ranks up there with House of Gucci as some of the most egregious in a movie in recent memory, with the vast majority of the cast slipping in and out of their Italian accents or, worse, sounding like they taught themselves by listening to Walt Disney’s Pinocchio (1940). 

‘One of the worst offenders is Patrick Dempsey as driver Piero Taruffi, whose casting is at least a fun Easter egg given Dempsey’s own connections to the motorsports world. 

‘The only person who sounds believably Italian is Penelope Cruz as Ferrari’s wife Laura, and that’s because it’s a slight variation on her normal speaking voice.’

Elsewhere fans had more to say on what they thought about Adam’s new movie, with some hailing: ‘I caught myself snoring’.

Taking to X, formerly known as Twitter, viewers had their say on what they thought about the hotly-anticipated biopic.

One wrote: ‘I was expecting something similar to Ford vs Ferrari. Ferrari’s personal life was featured more than the actual race cars or their development. Mostly shots of driving techniques, countryside and narrow winding roads. 

‘Patrick Dempsey’s role was minor and really didn’t add anything to the plot. I even caught myself snoring once.’

Another penned: ‘Makes no sense how movies about Napoleon, Leonard Bernstein, and Enzo Ferrari came out this year and instead of focusing on all the cool stuff, they made it about the marriage.’ 

Adam has the leading role in Ferrari, which examines three months in the life of Enzo Ferrari, the founder of the car company. He has money trouble, is grieving his son who died, and has a child with his mistress – which is discovered by his wife. 

After a near-empty red carpet premiere because of the SAG-AFTRA strikes, Adam and Michael settled in to watch the film, with the audience going wild for the biopic in autumn.

An emotional Adam choked back tears during the rapturous applause and was brought to his feet by Michael. 

Earlier in the day the Hollywood star showed his support for striking actors as he called out streaming services Netflix and Amazon for not being ‘willing to support’ people in the industry. 

Adam was quick to heap praise on the independent studio for their role in negotiating with SAG-AFTRA as he hit out at the larger production companies.

Speaking at the festival he began: ‘I’m very happy to be here to support this movie, and the truncated schedule that we had to shoot it and the efforts of all the incredible actors working on it and the crew.’ 

Adam continued: ‘But also, I’m very proud to be here to be a visual representation of a movie that’s not part of the AMPTP and to promote the SAG leadership directive which is an effective tactic which is the interim agreement.

‘The other objective is obviously to say, why is it that a smaller distribution company like Neon and STX International can meet the dream demands of what SAG is asking for — this is pre-negotiations — the dream version of SAG’s wishlist, but a big company like Netflix and Amazon can’t?

‘And every time people from SAG go and support a movie that has met the terms of the interim agreement, it just makes it more obvious that these people are willing to support the people that they collaborate with, and the others are not.

‘Understanding the interim agreement, it’s a no-brainer for all of these reasons why you’d want to support your union, and I’m here because of that: to stand in solidarity with them by showing up, and further proving the point that it’s really about the people you make it with.’