Film Reviews

Speed Racer

• Rating:
• Director: The Wachowski Brothers
• Starring: Christina Ricci
• Details: US / 129mins (PG)

Freakishly loyal to its cartoon original, Speed Racer sidesteps anything remotely realistic and consistently defies physics, as our baby-faced hero puts the petal to the metal in front of a green screen for nigh on two hours. Having lost his hotshot brother through an elongated bout of reckless driving, Speed (Hirsch) grows up to be somewhat of a maverick behind the wheel himself, wowing the CGI crowds with his unrivalled grasp of velocity. But the racing world is overrun with nasty Big City corporate types, and when one of them reacts badly to rejection by Speed, he and his family's lives are in imminent danger. Following up the huge disappointment of The Matrix Revolutions, the Wachowski Brothers try a completely different tact of attracting the younger generation to the multiplexes in a blockbuster that entertains sporadically, but never really engages the way it should. Visually, it's strangely pleasing, as the CGI seems to look cheesy on purpose, in order to evoke nostalgia for the aforementioned cartoon. But that's no excuse for dialogue that's functional at best, and a plot that stretches itself to snapping point a third of the way in. Hirsch is fine as our titular hero, intensely frowning in the cockpit of his mach-5 as he blasts away the opposition, seemingly with sheer willpower - and even Matthew Fox's suitably brooding turn as Racer X pleases. But the Wachowskis simply didn't put enough effort into their script, and went completely with the ocular eyegasms, forgoing any form of characterisation in the process. Sure, this is a kids' movie, so excuses will be made; but the former prodigal brothers have been riding on their visual prowess for far too long, and this script needed work before having $100 million thrown at it. It does have its moments though, most of them in the last half hour. A late night ninja attack is great fun as Fox shows some impressive hand-to-hand combat ability (even if Hirsch appears to swing like a drunk socialite at a bag-grabbing vagrant), and the last two races are particularly well done. Ultimately though, when you have to rely on a fat kid with a monkey channelling Joe Pesci for entertainment, you have to question the wisdom of spending so much money.

Review by Mike Sheridan