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Re: Here he come, here comes SPEED RACER...he's a demon on wheels.
Saw this last night in a sadly nearly empty theater (Iron Man, next door, still had a packed house). I wonder how this will do overall but I suspect after Iron Man's giant blitz last weekend along with its stellar reviews (compared to the anemic ones for Speed) we will see this movie fade away fairly quickly.
This is too bad because though maybe not as good as Iron Man, this is still a great time at the movies. From the opening music and colorform intro to the end of the credits where even simple words on screen are bursting with bits of color and motion this is a fun tribute to old school anime and Saturday morning cartoons.
The positives are long in this for me and even more for my wife who was the real SR fan. I liked it in passing and knew enough about it to be into it but she giggled far more often at references to the oringal show more often than me. The use of wipes as noted above was great. The overlapping characters was fantastic, especially when done along with flashbacks. The villain's monologue on "real race car driving" was fantastic as was the prep for the big race at the end. Too cool. "Cool" is the word for most of this movie. The cars, the car-fu, the sets, the costumes and the music were all cool and consistent throughout. There was never a moment that pulled me from the world the W Bro's created and that's a good thing.
The main bad guy Royalton was fantastic, even assuming the vocal stylings of the original series baddie (we get to hear original show dialogue in the credits that confirms this). I didn't think I would like Goodman as Pops but he was great throughout, especially during a couple very fun and light fight scenes. This was a worry of mine that the fight scenes would be more "Matrix" and counter to the fun of the show but while very nicely choreographed, they still contained the right level of slapstick and cool.
Car-fu will make or break this film for most. Cars bopped and jumped around in cartoonishly impossible ways (as they should). I loved it and the internal logic for how cars work on each other was great. The car designs were uniformly great throughout, too. I also loved how they fit the personality of their driver as well as how each driver's unique weaponry came out. The Snake team's stuff was by far the funniest.
I could go on and have but don't believe the ridiculously low Rotten Tomatoes Rating for this movie. Unlike Iron Man, which was made to appeal to a wider audience, Speed Racer was made for fans of the original show. If it brings in new viewers, bully for them, but really this was a unique, well crafted movie done with real style. It truly is style over substance and for this flick that is good enough for me. I hope more folks enjoy it before it goes away.
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