[excerpt] Speed Racer is a seizure inducing, Technicolor nightmare that can only be described as something akin to what an 8-year old sees after coating his Cocoa Puffs with Nestle Quik, Pixie Stix and Fun Dip before chasing it down with a Jolt Cola and then jumping up and down to make sure the whole concoction is well mixed. It is sugar-coated insanity racing at 200mph, bouncing off the walls, screaming at the top of its lungs and seeing colors you never thought existed. It is the movie Willy Wonka will heretofore project onto the walls of that batshit crazy ass tunnel of his.
So yes. I thought it was awesome.
Read the full review here
6 comments:
I think it's time to come clean. I've never seen Speed Racer, and I have no idea what it's about. I'm not sure whether I was too young or old, or whether I was just watching some other (lamer?) cartoon when the rest of the world was watching Speed Racer. Was it a Saturday morning thing, or one of those after school deals on channel 56?
I've never seen it either nor has it ever appealed to me. I've never been into the Japanese anime stuff. Here's some info,
Speed Racer is the title of an English adaptation of the Japanese anime Mach GoGoGo (マッハGoGoGo, Mahha GōGōGō?) which centered on automobile racing. The series is an early example of an anime becoming a successful franchise in the United States.
The characters and storylines originated in Japan as the manga and anime series Mach GoGoGo, from the anime studio Tatsunoko Productions.
Mach GoGoGo was first created, and designed, by anime pioneer Tatsuo Yoshida (1932–1977) as a manga series in the 1960s and made the jump to TV as an anime series in 1967. The central character in the anime and manga was a young race car driver named Gō Mifune (Mifune Gō). Yoshida selected the names and symbolism in his creation very carefully. The large red M on the hood of the Mach 5, which in North America was assumed to stand for "Mach 5," is actually the emblem of Mifune Motors, the family business. That is also the origin of the "M" on Gō's helmet. This was an homage to Japanese film star Toshiro Mifune. His given name, Gō, is also a Japanese homophone for the number 5 (the number on his race car). This is also represented by the yellow letter G embroidered on his short-sleeve blue shirt. The name of the series, Mach GoGoGo is actually a triple entendre: as mentioned, it stands for the number 5, i.e. it is the name of the car, the Mach 5; it is the name of the main character; and it contains the English word "go." Taken together, the program's title thus translates as, "Mach 5, Gō Mifune, Go!" The names themselves constitute a multi-lingual wordplay of the kind that had started to become part of the Japanese popular culture of the time. Yoshida got his idea for Speed Racer after seeing two films that were very popular in Japan at the time, Viva Las Vegas and Goldfinger. By combining the look of Elvis Presley's race-car driving image, complete with neckerchief and black pompadour, and James Bond's gadget-filled Aston Martin, Yoshida had the inspiration for his creation.
The English rights to Mach GoGoGo were immediately acquired by American syndicator Trans-Lux. The main character Gō Mifune was given the name "Speed Racer" in the English version. A major editing and dubbing effort was undertaken by producer Peter Fernandez, who also provided the voices of many of the characters, most notably Racer X and Speed Racer himself. Fernandez was also responsible for a rearrangement of the theme song's melody and subsequently wrote its English lyrics.
In a 2008 interview with Chicago Tribune DVD columnist Louis R. Carlozo, Fernandez recalled that he landed the job working on "Speed Racer" after ghost-writing scripts for "Astro-Boy" and "Gigantor." Simultaneously with "Speed Racer," Fernandez also voiced the main character and wrote scripts for another anime series, "Marine Boy," sometimes taping both shows in the same day in New York City. Fernandez also said he could not possibly have predicted "Speed Racer's" lasting appeal at the time or in the decades that followed. Reflecting on the series' staying power, he commented: "There was the family relationship. You knew about Speed's family, you knew them well. They were all involved in each race. And we all play with cars as little kids, we love cars. The Mach 5 was a hot car, and there all sorts of cars throughout all episodes. I still think the Mach Five is ahead of its time."
In an effort to squeeze the complicated plotlines into existing lip movements, the frenetic pace of the dubbing made Speed Racer famous-—and famously parodied-—for its quirky "fast" dialogue.
In the early 1990s the series made a comeback as reruns on MTV broadcast in the early morning hours. Several years later, Cartoon Network would broadcast the series in late afternoon (and later on in late night/overnight) programming. The series was distributed in the 1990s by Group W's international unit, but with all mentions of Trans-Lux Television deleted from the show's opening sequence.
Weird, I'm listening to an article on this on NPR right now! If you search for it, you'll probably be able to listen to it on their website.
USATODAY hated it, It may be a tricked-out ride, but Speed Racer (* ½ out of four) is too long for kids to sit still and too frenetic for their parents. Maybe teens and twentysomethings will pick up the slack.
For a movie about velocity, the excitement factor is low and the races feel like a drag. Perhaps that has a lot to do with its length: 2 hours and 15 minutes, which is at least a half-hour too long for a movie based on a cartoon. Or maybe it's the predictable story about a guy who goes up against crooked corporate sponsors.
Racer can look vibrant with its blend of live action and computer-generated animation. But the cars zipping around the track look interchangeable, and the action sequences are more video game than movie.
Writers/directors Larry and Andy Wachowski (TheMatrix trilogy) attracted some major acting talent. Emile Hirsch is fine as Speed, though the role doesn't exactly offer the challenge of his Oscar-caliber performance in Into the Wild. Christina Ricci is his girlfriend, Trixie, and Susan Sarandon and John Goodman play his parents.
But for filmmakers who pushed the envelope with the Matrix movies, Speed Racer just doesn't measure up. There are echoes of 2006's Cars and 1982's Tron — vivid special effects, the use of a video game-style competition. But it's often more garish than dazzling.
As a child, Speed Racer is not much of a scholar, preferring instead to hang around with his idol, older brother Rex. When Rex dies in a mysterious crash, Speed honors his memory by following in his footsteps.
Doggedly loyal to the family racing business, he turns down a profitable sponsorship deal from a conglomerate, so Royalton Industries' megalomaniacal owner (Roger Allam) promises to ruin Speed's career. Speed, determined to restore the family honor by competing in the cross-country rally that took his brother's life, teams up with Racer X (Matthew Fox) to expose Royalton's corruption.
Though it's a simple tale that should be understandable for viewers as young as 6, the filmmakers put so much emphasis on visual panache that narrative coherence suffers.
Yes, it's a candy-colored Day-Glo world, but there's a liveliness missing from this lead-footed Speed Racer.
I've never watched Speed Racer for more than 10 seconds without violently changing the channel. I was prepared to like the movie though, because the Matrix guys put it together but now I'm not so sure..
JPX, what does the ProJo guy say about it? If he hates it then you know it'll be great. (He has a 99% opposite accuracy rate.)
That's very true about Projo, I'll let you know tomorrow, when the old fart publishes his review.
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