Ayrton Senna was the Elvis Presley of grand-prix racing. The king of the Formula One circuit in the late '80s and early '90s, Senna was a boyishly handsome Brazilian whose foot-focused energy shook up the sport. Yet Senna was also an articulate and deeply spiritual man who felt that a fearless embrace of the race car brought him closer to God.

Blessed with such a catalytic character, Asif Kapadia's thoughtful, thrilling "Senna" is a sports documentary on overdrive.

Senna was the scion of a wealthy family from Rio de Janiero that financed his migration from go-kart competitions to the global Formula One series. Young Ayrton was an immediate sensation, with a particular talent for racing in the rain.

Like Elvis in "Viva Las Vegas," Senna had a European rival: Alain Prost, the perennial world champion from France. The inherent drama of their individual races is juiced with the through-line of the seasonal championships and a pair of a mirror-image mishaps at the Japanese Grand Prix that are almost too good to be true.

Prost was a calculating but cautious driver who was a stickler for the rules and an ally of the Frenchman who ran the sport's governing body. Although Senna was bold, he was also beloved by the other drivers and fought for their rights.

When two of those drivers are injured in the same weekend, the film builds to a shattering climax.

Senna's career coincided with the rise of portable cameras, so the races and rivalries (and even the romances) are captured from a multitude of angles, including from the cockpit of his careening race car as it roars toward the finish line.

With such supercharged material under the hood, a magnetic man behind the wheel and a nimble director manning the pits, "Senna" is simply the greatest sports film I have ever seen.

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"Senna"

Four stars (out of four) • Rated PG-13 • Run time 1:46 • Content Strong language and disturbing images • Where The Tivoli