SPEED RACER (2008)

by Dave White

Who's in It: Emile Hirsh, Christina Ricci, John Goodman, Susan Sarandon, Matthew Fox

The Basics: Speed Racer battles capitalism and a huge gang of race-car-driving total cheaters when he takes on the meanest, richest racing tycoon alive and defends the honor of his father, his dead older brother, Rex Racer, and all of the sport of racing by vrooming to the finish line first in the world's biggest vroom-fest. There's also a chimp.

What's the Deal? You know what's great about being assigned a review of this movie? I could just write "OOGA-BOOGA, OOGA-BOOGA, YOW-YOW-YOW, TRIXIE!" over and over and people would go see this anyway. The other great thing about writing "OOGA-BOOGA, OOGA-BOOGA, YOW-YOW-YOW, TRIXIE!" over and over again is that it would actually be a meaningful analysis of the movie, which is brilliantly, manically, brain-meltingly bizarre, the coolest nonsense you'll see all year. It's a win-win for the critic and the audience.

Favorite Part: There's a big fight scene — and I mean, this is the big fight scene of the whole movie — and the entire thing is accomplished with people leaping into the air and freezing that way in action poses. Seriously. It's like being art-pranked by someone saying, "OK, this is the idea of fighting. I'm commenting on fighting." And even though you kind of admire the prank player for his nerve, you still want to punch him in the face.

Other Favorite Parts, Besides All the Scenes With the Chimp, Which Are Usually Automatically My Favorite Part of Any Movie Awesome Enough to Include a Chimp: When the characters are allowed to bend time, leaping from one subplot to another. At other moments, they experience the future in fast-forwardy sequences before returning to the "real" action. Or maybe that future action is really happening in some other dimension? I don't know.

Net Effect on Your Consciousness: As though you had just drowned in a huge tilt-a-whirling bowl of psychedelic pudding.

CRITICS' REVIEWS SOURCE RATING THE GIST POSITIVE REVIEWS FOR SPEED RACER Chicago Tribune 3 stars/4 "… as big, blaring blockbusters go, it's a bit of a hypocrite. It is also self-congratulatory." Premiere 3 stars/4 "… if viewed from one angle, the most headache inducing kid's movie of them all; if viewed from another, it's the most expensive avant-garde film ever made." NEGATIVE REVIEWS FOR SPEED RACER New York Times N/A "… this movie sets out to honor and refresh a youthful enthusiasm from the past and winds up smothering the fun in self-conscious grandiosity." USA Today 1½ stars/4 "… too long for kids to sit still and too frenetic for their parents." Village Voice N/A "… a self-consciously tawdry trifle …" MIXED REVIEWS FOR SPEED RACER Entertainment Weekly C "Young boys are the only suitable audience …" Hollywood Reporter N/A "… causes the sensation of being trapped inside a 3-D video game." MSNBC N/A "… an ice-cream headache of a movie that just keeps piling on the unnatural colors …" TV Guide 2 stars/4 "… more irritating because it looks like a Hot Wheels video game or because the brothers seem to think that there's a powerful family drama humming away beneath the flashing lights and spinning wheels." Variety N/A "… a blur of video action painting and very loud sounds notable solely for its technical wizardry. Otherwise, it's pure cotton candy …"