Go, Speed Racer, Go!
Posted by Skrud at Sunday, May 11th 2008 at 11:20pm
It’s like thick, syrupy awesome-butter spread liberally over two hours and ten minutes, garnished with awesome-sprinkles and jellybeans. I don’t even like jellybeans, but I’d eat them just to watch Speed Racer again.
I have vague memories of watching the original Speed Racer cartoon as a kid, though I’m not sure how young I was then. Fresher in my memory is The New Adventures of Speed Racer, an American adaptation that was more like the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles than anything else. According to Wikipedia, it was pretty unsuccessful and only ran for 13 episodes. That’s a damn shame, because the theme song rocked.
The new movie was a perfect adaptation of what I remember from the original cartoon. It felt like watching a cartoon. It was so exaggerated and over-the-top that I was giddy the entire time. It was outrageous, chock full of cartoon-style action, impossible physics, wild colours, ninjas, cheese, and everything else that I love about movies. Speed Racer was the most awesome movie I’ve seen since Godzilla: Final Wars. It’s a total throwback to old school Japananimation, from back when it was still called Japanimation. If you’ve ever paid attention to how those old cartoons were animated, you’ll love all the little details in Speed Racer. There were some scenes that were a cool modernization of the multiplane camera, where buildings in the background seemed 2-dimensional in an otherwise completely 3-dimensional world. Visually, the movie was stunning. The casting was likewise perfect. We’re talking Patrick-Stewart-as-Professor-X calibre of perfect.
Speed Racer isn’t a movie for people who are expecting a real movie. It’s a movie for people who want to see a cartoon exploding all over their brains. It’s a movie I’d watch over and over again and again like Godzilla Final Wars, which is my current movie of choice for when I need a dose of instant awesome.
Speed Racer made me all happy and giddy. I’d see it again any time.
