Ferrari Roma review: the cheapest Ferrari of them all

It’s like you’ve dived head-first into a vat of dopamine. This is my type of car.

All Italian: the Ferrari Roma

This week I’m reviewing the Ferrari Roma, which is the cheapest Ferrari of them all. I took it over to see my friend Eric, who knows his cars and has owned many great Ferraris in the past. He climbed in, took one look at the digital dash and the complicated steering wheel, and declared: “They’ve lost the plot.”

There’s more. Ferrari is saying the Roma is 70 per cent new, but people with way too much time on their hands have worked out it has exactly the same wheelbase as the unloved Portofino, so they’re saying that while 70 per cent of the components may be new, the basic architecture of the car is not new at all.

Others are suggesting that it was supposed to have been a Maserati but Fiat changed its mind at the last minute and stuck a prancing horse badge on it. Everyone else I talked to, including one guy who has actually ordered one, said it looks very much like an Aston Martin. It doesn’t. It does, however, look like an F-type Jaguar, which costs $180,000 less.

In short, then, the Roma doesn’t have much appeal to Ferrari fans, it may not be what it says it is, and it isn’t what you’d call good value.

I’ve been saying for years that Ferrari is losing its way – that it’s a hatmaker first and foremost, and that the cars it makes are way too big and way too powerful. So I was rather looking forward to the Roma because it’s small, and because its engine is not completely bonkers, and it’s at the front, which is where Ferrari always put them in the glory days. And why should we criticise it for looking like an F-type Jag?

Then there’s the price issue. Sure, it costs more than a Jag or a Porsche, and a hell of a lot more than a Ford Mustang, but that’s OK if it has the Ferrari magic. And it just does. It’s a combination of many things, both visual and sensual, that causes the pit of your stomach to feel warm, as though everything is suddenly all right in the world. I know this sounds like pretentious twaddle but it really does happen. Oh, and when you put your foot down and there’s a combination of sound and torque-driven fury, it’s like you’ve dived head-first into a vat of dopamine. It feels different to other cars somehow: lighter, sharper, better.

I always get this feeling in a small, V8-powered Ferrari. They are just so bloody exciting. The twin-turbo V8 produces 456kW, which is a lot, but not so much that you immediately hit a tree. It’s fun power.

So what we have here is a car that tickles your tickly bits, and roars the triumphant roar of flat-plane internal combustion, and on the stretch of road I use when I have a nice car it was wonderful. It’s my kind of car, this.

Maybe, and it’s a big maybe, a mid-engined 488 would be a tiny bit more darty, but in a 488 you’d have to slow down for all the crests or you’d graunch the underside of its low nose. Whereas in a Roma you can keep right on going. As an all-round driving machine, then, it is fantastic. It’s practical, too; because the engine is in the front, you get a decent-sized boot and back seats (although even Richard Hammond would moan about being squashed).

Further forwards there’s a lot of clever-clever electronic interface stuff, with glass screens and haptic buttons and so forth, and I know this has gone down badly with some, but I thought it all worked quite well. For once I didn’t even mind having most of the controls on the steering wheel. It’s still a stupid idea not to have stalks for the wipers and indicators, but at least in the Roma I’d figured out the headlight dim/dip operation after only three days of swearing.

However, the whole thing then comes crashing down because of the seats. There’s no proper lateral support no matter what you do with the controls, and you feel like you’re sitting on them rather than in them. They are terrible. You’d be better off ordering the car with none at all and using your kitchen chairs instead.

Of course you can opt for sports seats instead, which, of course, brings me on to the other problem with this car. The crazy options list. You want the rear diffuser to be made from carbon fibre? Well, that’s $12,000. Two-tone leather is $8600. Basically everything is an option, which is why the test car I drove would actually cost me an extra $100,000. The Roma’s good. Very good. It’s elegant and subtle and pretty and fast and surprisingly practical. I really liked it, but at that price I’m not sure I could bring myself actually to buy one.

FERRARI ROMA

ENGINE: 3.9-litre twin-turbo V8 petrol (456kW / 760Nm)

TRANSMISSION: Eight-speed dual-clutch automatic

PRICE: From $409,888

STARS: Four out of five