Speed Racer tries to win the big race to foil the plans of corporations who want their own racers to win.

CRITIQUE

Speed Racer is a huge car wreck, a big, expensive, overblown movie that has no apparent idea what audience it is trying to entertain, and ultimately is likely to entertain no one.  What should have been a fun action movie is a muddled mess of special effects, one-note characters and dull plot elements that ultimately add up to a film that misses on almost every level.

The tale is set in a future in which car racing is more like bumper cars, as high-tech vehicles bang off each other and spin around while zooming at incredibly-high speeds.  It turns out that auto racing is apparently very corrupt, which just begs the question of why we should care about any of these races; the film just doesn’t make its central sport very enticing, while even the rules around very clear.

What’s clear is that we are supposed to be rooting for Speed Racer (Emile Hirsch), because he is a nice guy, who aside from that he really doesn’t get any development at all.  He’s not even really an underdog, while since he is a great driver from the opening scene, there’s no sense that he learns anything at all doing the script.  The other characters are equally flat; there’s not a single role or relationship that is interesting, while a running mystery about whether Racer X is really Speed’s supposed-dead older brother Rex never makes much sense at all.

Because of this, the film just doesn’t have anything to pull us in.  It isn’t helped by a plot that tries to keep establishing various villains, without ever making it all that clear (or interesting) what is going on.  Kids will likely be bored by everything but the races (and possibly Speed Racer’s annoying little brother Spritle and his pet monkey), but unfortunately even the races are candy-colored chunks of computer animation that are hard to follow and never realistic or dangerous enough to care about.

The film is based on the cult-classic TV series, and has been written and directed by the Wachowski Brothers.  But they are just continuing their spiral down from the heights of The Matrix; there’s just no finesse here, no real fun, and just very little of any interest that happens.  It’s just a disappointment on all levels.

THE VIDEO

Speed Racer is presented in widescreen, in a letterbox format (with no specific details).  The picture quality is crisp, though it’s still hard to tell that is going on.

THE AUDIO

Speed Racer is presented in English 5.1, French 5.1 and Spanish 5.1 Dolby Digital Surround.  Dialogue, music and sound effects come through very clear.  There are English, Spanish and French subtitles.

THE EXTRAS

Spritle in the Big Leagues is a 14-minute kid-friendly featurette that follows young actor Paulie Litt as he talks to a lot of the crew members.

Speed Racer: Supercharged! is a 15-minute featurette about the racecars that appear in the film, though since most of them make since little impression in the movie itself, it feels like a lot of effort to little real purpose.

FINAL THOUGHT

May well be the worst movie of the year, especially given what it cost to make.