Speed Racer

Nostalgia is very big in movies right now. Transformers started the trend and right now a G.I Joe movie is in production and Masters of the Universe is not far behind. Speed Racer did seem like an odd choice though. Basing a live action movie on a Japanese cartoon from the 60s/90s didn't seem like a sure thing. But, when the makers of The Matrix chose this as their follow up, there was excitement about it. The Wachowski Brothers have a knack for revolutionizing special effects and when I heard that the movie was going to be shot almost entirely in deep focus, I was more intrigued. The trailers were fun, but as the movie got closer, it started to look less and less like a sure thing.

Speed Racer(Emile Hirsch) only cares about one thing: racing. He is a race car driver and he lives to be on the track. His parents Mom and Pop Racer (Susan Sarandon and John Goodman) raised him in a racing environment and his older brother Rex(Scott Porter) taught everything he knew about racing. Speed is on the track when the movie opens and in a very long opening scene we get all of the exposition we could ever need. Rex died years ago in a bad race car accident, but before he died Rex' name had been totally desecrated. he was called a cheater and a low life. Speed is racing to forget all of that. With his little brother Spritle(Paulie Litt), girlfriend Trixie(Christina Ricci) and the rest of his family watching, Speed wins the race and catches the eye of Mr. Royalton. Royalton wants to make Speed a member of his big corporate racing team, but Speed is not sure he wants to do it. When Speed says no, Royalton goes into a crazy long and excruciatingly boring speech about what will happen to Speed now. He will lose the next race, not qualify for the championship and his name will be desecrated. After all of that comes true, Speed is forced to race outside of the track. He and a mysterious racer named Racer X(Matthew Fox) join forces with another racer to win this elaborate cross state race in hopes of getting the other racer to turn on Royalton. Plans fail, double crosses happen and Speed somehow finds himself in the Grand Prix race.

Will Speed win? What really happened to Rex? Just who is the mysterious Racer X? Oh gives a crap! By the time this movie gets to the damn final race about 2 hours of nonsense prior to it have obliterated any passing interest I once had. Visually Speed Racer plays like a live action cartoon without a sense of subtly, humor or good taste. Even the most fabulous Gay guy is going to wish it wasn't so colorful. This is an unbelievable pile of crap. The Wachowski's have bombed yet again and it appears maybe the first Matrix was merely a fluke in an otherwise awful career. The acting all around is just terrible, which is saying something because they are all talented people. There is way to much time spent with the annoying younger brother and his stupid monkey. This movie is obviously aimed at children, but it is too long and boring for them and while the colors are pretty for a while, at some point you just become immune to them and want a cohesive story. If I may use an analogy, Speed Racer is very much like a really pretty girl who is an idiot. For a while you don't even realize she is an idiot because of how pretty she is. Then when you realize it, you forgive her because she is so pretty, but at some point her stupidity overrides her hotness. Speed Racer starts as a gorgeous piece of moving art, but at some point the fact that it sucks overrides the moving artiness of the picture.

I don't want to be subtle in my review so how I can plainly put this? Here it is: I would rather be locked in a room with Will Ferrell while I am on a StairMaster listening to Garth Brooks and looking at naked pictures of Rosie O'Donnell than ever watch this movie again. How is that for hyperbole?!?! Speaking of hyperbole, Speed Racer uses the transitional aspect of the cartoon, but over uses so much, they start high lighting mundane activities and by using that transitional method they attempt to make them greater than they really are. Even the music in Speed sucks. Michael Giacchino usually creates brilliantly lavish scores of action adventure, heightening the sense of danger or mystery, but here he reuses the old Speed Racer theme song every 5 minutes to create the most obnoxious score I can ever remember hearing in a movie.

The one thing that could have saved this movie was the big final race. If it had been awesomely awesome, all else could have been forgiven. Yet, instead of ramping up the action for the big finale, the movie SLOWS DOWN!! During the race, the movie keeps cutting back to scenes from earlier so we can see what Racer is racing for. Inf act, if you just watched the 15 minutes of the movie you would get everything that happened and you would save yourself from the two hours prior! I cannot in good faith recommend this to anyone, not even my biggest enemy, if I had one. No one in the right minds should watch it and if you were to tell me you loved it I might have to question your sanity. I am not only dumber for watching this, I am angrier at kids, monkeys, The Wachowskis and racing. Speed Racer commits the worst sin in movies: It was supposed to be awesome and it sucked. There is nothing worse than thinking something will be awesome only to have it suck. This belongs in a group with Pirates 2 and Van Helsing.

Final Grade: F