One of the Most Underrated Movies Ever (Speed Racer)

If you did a double take at the title of the blog post you are exactly the kind of person who needs to be reading this post. Well, maybe not needs, but strongly encouraged to read and understand.

Speed Racer is (originally) an anime from 1967. Because it was one of the earliest Japanese programs brought over to the US, it has left an indelible mark on it's culture. This is perhaps assisted by the delightfully cheesy dubbed dialogue (that rarely matches the lip flaps and is ridiculously fast paced and contrived) as well as insane plots. In Japan it was called Mach Go Go Go! If you have ever seen an anime parody that featured terrible dialogue (that didn't match lip flaps at all) featured a ridiculous plot and had bad animation and it was before the big anime boom it was probalby making fun of Speed Racer.

 On top of all of this: it was awesome. Warning: Spoilers past this point for those who don't want to know the plot.

The plot centered around a young man by the name of Speed Racer. He wants to be a race car driver, but his father is strongly against it because Rex Racer (Speed's elder brother) was in a terrible crash that he miraculously survived. Pops was furious and forbade him from ever racing again. Rex, having none of it, ran away and adopted the secret identity of Racer X, Speed's chief rival (who, just in case the viewer forgot, had narration every time he came on reminding the audience that unbeknownst to Speed, Racer X is secretly Rex Racer). Through out his career as a professional race car driver Speed faces many interesting foes, such as Snake Oiler, Captain Terror, and other gimmicky names. The races themselves were always dangerous with rain, snow, and collapsing rocks.

An interesting feature of this show that is impossible to ignore would be the cars the races took place in. Speed Racer drove the most popular car, the Mach 5. Not only could these cars hit ridiculous speeds and looked nothing like normal cars, they could also do amazing stunts. The Mach 5 had jump jacks, a homing pigeon robot, bullet proof dome, the ability to go under water, super grip tires, saws that popped out the front and seat two people comfortably and fit a child and chimpanzee in the trunk! There was rarely an episode where Sprite and Chim-Chim, Speed's little brother and his pet Chimp, snuck into the trunk of the Mach 5. Racer X drove the almost as iconic Shooting Star, which is the most masculine yellow car ever. Perhaps the true second most iconic car was the mammoth car. It was nearly as long as a train and made ominous noises, on top of this it was driven by mobsters. It was later revealed the car was secretly made of...get this....solid gold. You find  this out after it crashes and catches on fire. Have you figured out what kind of show this is yet?

The show was slightly more violent than many other cartoons at the time (dealing with violent car crashes and mobsters trying to fix races). People actually died and would stay dead. Guns were fired (thus the need for bullet proof glass).

This show was delightfully cheesy the way Doctor Who used to be (and to some still is, but that's another post) delightfully cheesy. If delightfully cheesy isn't your thing then I cannot help you. You'll always hate Speed Racer.

In 2008 the Wachowski Brothers, of Matrix fame, released a live-action adaptation. And they meant Live-Action adaptation of Speed Racer.

The plot of the movie is slightly different than the description of the anime above. Speed is a rookie driver who is taking the World Racing League by storm driving a car of his father's creation, the Mach 6 (the Mach 5 is a street car in this continuity). He is offered a spot on the Royalton Racing Team by corrupt corporate excutive, Royalton, himself. After Speed turns him down Royalton reveals that racing has been fixed for years and that since Speed is turning his back on a corporate sponsor he's giving up the ability to win a race ever again. Speed begins to believe Royalton after he fails to finish his next race, just as Royalton had predicted. Shortly afterward Speed is approached by Racer X and a fellow driver named Taejo to race in the rally, Casa Cristo 5000, the same rally that killed Speed's elder brother Rex after he stopped racing for Racer Motors. IF Taejo can win this race, he'll testify that Royalton fixes races. Pops forbids Speed from driving in the race. Trixie and Speed sneak off to compete in the race anyway and are soon found out by his family. They agree to let him finish the race. After many dramatic race scenes, as well as a fight with a ninja, Speed, X, and Taejo win the rally. Taejo's father then sells his company for a lot of money, and Taejo reveals he was never going to testify. This pisses Speed off and he drives around the track Rex used to take him to. He meets X there and X reveals he is NOT Speed's brother.

Shorly afterward, Speed almost leaves his home the way Rex did when Pops tells him Speed is always welcome back (a flip from what he told Rex all those years ago). Taeko's sister, until now a fixture in the background, gives Speed a ticket to the Grand Prix (the big final race). Despite having a MILLION DOLLAR price on his head he not only gets tied for first in record time, he then restarts his car, through just sheer will power and WINS the race! Racer X watches the whole thing and reminisces about how he had plastic surgery and had to leave his family behind, his family being the Racers, duh. Speed changes racing forever and Royalton goes to jail. YAY!

That right there is just like the TV show. Sure the plot isn't a masterpiece, but it was fun and had energy. The way it slightly tweaked the formula of a Speed Racer plot worked and updated it for a modern audience. The race scences were dramatic and had lots of fun especially the insane visuals that happened during them. Every character was true to form and yet highly enjoyable. Even Spritle and Chim Chim who I didn't like that much on the TV show.

The amazing parts though are the editing and the visuals. I think I'll tackle the editing first. All exposition and various edits are done in a full rotation. The camera will start on a character and it will rotate to either back story, or a different view. It is handled particularly well especially in cases of exposition. It shows how the flash back actually is affecting the character having the flash back. It is spread out enough it doesn't feel  weighty and yet it comes quickly enough you don't feel left out.

And now to the visuals. The visuals were stunning, if a little overwhelming at first. The colors are hyper saturated. The sky is blue. The clouds are white. I realize this all sounds incredibly obvious, but this film is colorful and fully uses the brightest colors it can. The world is a live action cartoon minus actual cartoon characters, so basically it was Avatar before Avatar (James Cameron not Nickleodeon). The world draws you in and blinds you for looking at it. I know words are failing me here, it's just very hard to describe Speed Racer without seeing it. All I can say is that is is a live action cartoon with all the silliness that generally happens in this type of cartoon.

In many ways the Avatar comparison works really well. Both had immersive, fully CG worlds. Both would benefit from 3D technology (Avatar is better in 3D and Speed Racer is the one movie that may actually be improved with Hollywood's 3D obsession.). Both have more focus on the visual over plot. Both plots are old and used. The problem is Speed Racer was slightly ahead of it's time.

So, if you like fun movies with cheesy plots or if you just want to see the insane visuals I cannot recommend Speed Racer highly enough. I'm not saying it's a perfect movie, but I love Speed Racer for what it is. That's why I love the movie.