“It’s Racer X, The Harbinger of Boom!”
Speed Racer makes the leap from afternoon weekday cartoons of my youth to the big screen with flesh and blood actors.
TITLE:
SPEED RACER
Director:
Andy Wachowski and Larry Wachowski (The Wachowski Brothers)
Writer:
Andy Wachowski and Larry Wachowski
GENRE:
Adventure, Thriller, Fantasy,
DESCRIPTORS:
Cars, Driving, Car Racing, Stunt Racing, Family Business, Fixed Races, Corruption, Graft, Investigation, Death, Secret Identity,
RATING:
Rated PG
SUMMARY:
As a boy, all Speed could think about was race car driving — it was a family business. His older brother Rex taught Speed how to drive before he was tall enough to reach the gas pedal. And then Rex left the family and died in a mysterious racing accident.
Terrible what passes for a ninja these days.
As a young man, Speed Racer is winning races and beginning to get noticed. Mr. Royalton of Royalton Industries wishes to sponsor Speed but he turns Royalton down. He does not take refusal gracefully. He lets Speed in on the secret that all the races are fixed and by turning him down, he has just insured that he’ll never win another race as long as he lives.
Royalton leans heavily on the Racer family, threatening to bankrupt the family business. But Speed gains an allies in Inspector Detector and the mysterious Racer X who want to see the power the industries hold over racing outcomes broken. And the key to breaking their stranglehold and saving the sport may lie in the Crucible, a dangerous cross-country race that years ago claimed the life of Rex Racer.
APPEAL:
As a boy I remember coming home from school and watching the Speed Racer cartoon series on television. I loved the special abilities the car had and the dial on the steering wheel that could make the Mach 5 jump, glide, whip out buzz saws to cut down obstacles in the way and more. The Mach 5 and Racer X made that cartoon one of my favorites. In the cartoon, as far as I can remember, the gadgets were there only to be used if another racer was cheating or if Speed was caught in a dangerous situation.
Haven’t any of these drivers read the rule book?
In the Wachowski movie, the stunts that the Mach 5 could do was part of stunt racing, the sport Speed Racer loved so much. In fact there was a fight scene in the movie done entirely by the stunt cars. It was exhilarating to watch and, oddly enough, reminded me of “gun-kata” moves from Equilibrium starring Christian Bale.
The acting was solid but the setting and the dress were bright primary and secondary colors — much like the color scheme in Dick Tracy starring Warren Beatty. The effect is to give the movie a comic feel. It also distanced me from the story. Many of the transitions from scene to scene were done in anime style. Again, it created a sense of unreality that shoved me out of the movie.
In the end, despite efforts of most of the actors, I couldn’t get drawn into the movie for long periods of time. Which was a shame.
WATCHALIKES:
As I watched Speed Racer, I was constantly reminded of Dick Tracy, The Flintstones with John Goodman and The Cat in the Hat with Mike Myers.
No, he’s going to be the best . . . if they don’t destroy him first.
An unlikely “watchalike” might be Equilibrium for its martial arts form of gun fighting called gun kata.I can think of nothing else that is similar to the Wachowski Speed Racer. If you liked the movie, perhaps you should try the original cartoon series and see what you think.
You can order this and other movies through the Heights Library web catalog or order by phone by calling the Cleveland Heights-University Heights Public Library.
Comments on this entry are closed.