Filming for the Ocean's Eleven prequel, currently titled Sandcastles, took Monaco back to the 1960s in late August, recreating the 1962 Monaco Grand Prix for the film. The Warner Bros production, starring Margot Robbie and Bradley Cooper and due for release next year, was in the principality until Friday, August 28, shooting at iconic Formula One locations including the harbour at Port Hercule and the Portier corner, just before the tunnel entrance.
The racing connection is not incidental: the film's major heist takes place during the 1962 Monaco Grand Prix. Released footage shows classic cars running on bygone layouts of the track, complete with the outdated safety measures of the era, including haybales for barriers. One piece of fan footage even showed classic cars taking the Grand Hotel hairpin in the opposite direction to the real circuit, an odd continuity detail but perhaps a fittingly Hollywood one.
The 1962 race being recreated ended with victory for Bruce McLaren in a Cooper Climax, who took the lead late in the race after Graham Hill's BRM engine expired with just eight laps of the 100 lap race remaining, leaving Hill classified sixth. Lotus's Jim Clark had taken his first ever pole position but retired on lap 55 with a clutch issue. The podium was completed by Ferrari's Phil Hill, the defending world champion, and Lorenzo Bandini.
The Monaco Grand Prix was first held in 1950, the championship's inaugural year, and has since run 72 editions. Though the circuit remains constrained by the principality's streets, it has changed in several ways over the decades, including the position of the start line, the Rascasse corner, the addition of the swimming pool section, the chicane after the tunnel, and the tunnel itself.