I was in two minds on this one. To be honest I hadn't read alot about the flick before during and after it's release in May of this year. I am really not a big race car fan, Nascar doesn't do it for me, Days of Thunder didn't get me all hot under the hood and so when a movie called Speed Racer opens with the poster you see here I was well, 'meh'.So then why did I end up watching this movie on DVD? Good question. I have United Airlines to thank for this one because for a couple of weeks this seemed to be playing on every flight I was on. I chose not to watch it in the air as I could tell it was a pretty special movie from a visual perspective and so wanted to enjoy the quality of a DVD to appreciate it fully. From digitalcontentproducer.com:
'Visual Effects Supervisor John Gaeta calls the style pioneered on Speed Racer many things. Among them: “virtual cinematography,” “photo-anime,” and “2 1/2 D” layering. When he and Dan Glass first started working on the project, it was a liberating experience to force themselves to let go of the need for any kind of photorealistic element. This quality is something ingrained into any visual-effects artist worth his salt from the get go. Letting go of that instinct is like asking a cat to ignore a mouse.'
So off to google I went and it turns out this movie was directed, produced and written by the Matrix brothers themselves Larry and Andy Wachowski. Well that was reason enough to add it to the Netflix list! Naturally I am only referring to the 1st Matrix movie and not parts 2 & 3 which were such bloated affairs that they almost ruined the memory and impact the original had when it came out ... oh Neo, how we miss you ... 'Woah'!
So back to Speed Racer. Well frankly the visuals were the only thing I liked about this movie and believe me they were stunning. Brothers Wachowski created a hyper real world that was part Pushing Daisies and part Fifth Element. You could sit and watch this movie with the sound off and just marvel at the artistic vision at work but at 135 minutes that alot of arty appreciation! I think it's fair to say 41 year olds (moi) were not the target market the filmmakers were after when this was released and perhaps it went down a storm with the 10-15 year old male demographic. In fact according to IMDBpro the movie has grossed over $95m worldwide so there are clearly alot of race fans out there gagging for an avant garde take on their beloved sport!
There was no shortage of talent onscreen with John Goodman, Susan Sarandon, Christina Ricci and Emile Hirsch taking the lead but great actors cannot overcome the weak plot & dialogue that sank this movie for me. Shame really this is a great example of a movie I was ready to love and ended up well, 'meh'.
Rating: **
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