Page 13: New biopic reflects on the life of racing legend Peter Brock

Peter Brock was an icon of Australian motor racing, who changed the sport forever. More than a decade after his tragic death, a new biopic will reveal tales from those who knew him best.

He was known as the rock star of motor racing. “Peter Perfect” Brockwon Bathurst nine times and petrolheads queued in their hundreds for him to sign publicity posters.

Next week, those who knew him best will tell their stories at Hitmaker Studios in Port Melbourne for a new biopic on the driver better known than Australian F1 stars Mark Webber or Daniel Ricciardo.

Brock, dubbed “King of the Mountain” at Bathurst, was a three-time Australian touring car champion and Motor Racing Hall of Fame inductee.

His life ended in a crash in a rally in Western Australia when his car slid into a tree.

Peter Brock.

He’d previously never had a bad accident on the racetrack — Brocky’s reputation as a driver was based as much on his road safety campaigns as it was on his numerous race victories.

When he was younger, he was a tearaway. He lived life as fast as he drove on the race tracks, but later he became the face of the .05 drink-driving campaign.

“He was loved,” wife Bev Brock said at the time of his shock death.

“He was in the public eye and everything had to be done with a flourish and with a bang.

“It’s probably the way he would want to go out and how he would want to be remembered.”

“Bevo” was at Peter Janson’s marvellous concert party at his Rutherglen townhouse on Tuesday night, talking with Brock’s great on-track rival Allan Moffat. Captain Janson, also a racing driver, was second twice at the Bathurst race.

Peter Brock goes into a spin at Wanneroo Park in May 1979. Picture: Greg Burke

Part of the motivation for the Brock bio has been a Channel 10 telemovie starring Matthew Le Nevez that failed to capture the essential Brock. But director Kriv Stenders has been inspired by the pic on triple-F1 world champion Ayrton Senna and is calling on those who knew Brock on and off the track to tell it like it was.

Those who were there will be at Hitmaker Studios at Prohasky St in Port Melbourne on Tuesday night to remember their part in it all.

Stenders, whose credits include Danger Close: The Battle of Long Tan and the acclaimed Red Dog, and backers Universal Studios can only hope it’s another win for Brock.

Like Senna, the Brock biopic will include clips from his greatest races. Those to be interviewed include Bev Brock and Brock’s long-time PR chief Tim “Plastic” Pemberton.

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Brock’s brother Phil “The Split-Pin” Brock will be another, describing the little remembered Channel 10 telemovie as “pathetic crap,” littered with inaccuracies and “not even a B-grade movie”.

They call a spanner a spanner, the Brocks.

“The Pin”, long and leggy, was a stunt driver in the first and third Mad Max movies, Mad Max and Mad Max: Beyond Thunderdome.

Pedal to the metal!

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