Synopsis

I don’t think I can really provide a summary for this one for a variety of reasons. Sure I could for the movie in and of itself, but considering the movie is such a tribute to the rich history of this story, I’m thinking I should probably take some time out to delve into that in the review proper before talking about the movie itself.

Review

”Speed Racer” is the Americanized name of the Japanese series “Mach GoGoGo!” originally serialized in manga form by its creator Tatsuo Yoshida. It details the trials and tribulations of Go Mifune, or Speed Racer as he was called over here, in a fictionalized racing circuit that deals with cars and tracks you’d more likely see, if the story were more serious, in “Death Race 2000” or possibly the opening battles of the Cybertronian wars.

The original manga was started back in the 1960’s and was originally lifted from Tatsuo Yoshida’s previous project, “Pilot Ace.” Later, in 1967, he adapted into a 52 episode anime that expanded on the manga’s storyline, but keeping the incredible pulse pounding (pardon the expression) speed and pacing that made the manga such a hit. Almost immediately it was acquired by the company Trans-Lux for localization over here and has become one of the greatest of anime legends both in Japan and over here. It’s really hard to find someone who doesn’t at least know what Speed Racer is, especially in the older generation of fans who grew up actually watching it.

Thing about “Speed Racer” is that it’s older than a great deal of fans. Quite a number who grew up watching it would be in their late thirties and possibly their early to late forties. This is how far back we’re talking about here…almost to the very beginning of it all. For myself, I remember watching it on some local station (before the big networks took over) back in the late seventies and early eighties along with “G-Force” and “Tranzor-Z.” However, given my age at the time, I can only recall vague imperfect details of scenes that struck me and the enjoyment I got from watching such shows. Now adays, I find the attempts at dubbing and localization cheesy as Hell (and let’s face it, they were) at best when I catch the occasional ep. However, at the time things were practically in their infancy over here, and it wasn’t until relatively recently that we’ve been able to import the series over here wholesale. More, the audience that it ensnared as small children has grown up, along with an appreciation of how the stories are told in their purest forms leading into far more accurate and higher quality dubbing, subtitles, and many of us just learning Japanese to read and listen to them without any filters applied. The point of what I’m trying to get at here, is this was one of the gateways that anime first came into the United States, and is, in many ways directly responsible for everything we have now over here. With this in mind, a movie based on this foundation had BETTER goddamn pay fucking attention to not only the history of the story, but to the fact that there are a whole helluva lot of us who lived, loved, and took our parts (small individually, but large collectively) in that history as it was being made.

So, did they? To put it in the simplest terms, the Wachowski brothers have just up and buried the hatchet once and for all with their obvious anime addiction. I’ll admit to being a little concerned considering what I read about where they got their inspiration for “The Matrix” and that massive hack job they pulled on “V for Vendetta,” but Hell, “Speed Racer”…I had to go see just how the Hell they could possibly make a movie about that.

As I said, they finally just f’n did the deed. This is not a cartoon turned into a live action movie with realistic physics like “Transformers.” This is not a movie with anime based parts like the “Dragon Ball Z” portions of “The Matrix.” This is outright walking into your favorite Saturday morning cartoon and taking an active part.

This world, and all that was in it, they created is exactly how the world would look like if the real world were an anime. The use of CGI and brightly colored prop sets (mostly CGI though) was omnipresent through the entire movie, and for what they were going for, it had to be. Admittedly everything was bright, vivid, almost surreal, but then, again, that’s exactly the effect they were going for: a real life anime. To this end, rather than the emulated 3D of hand drawn and cell shaded sets and characters, such as the ones seen in “Who Framed Roger Rabbit” we are treated to computer drawn 3D representations of objects and scenery that gives the actors a more ‘realistic’ means of interacting with such things, while keeping the cartoony aspect intact.

This translated into a need for actors that looked the part and wardrobe that was, for all intents and purposes, exact recreations of what was portrayed in the manga and anime. In this respect, they did not disappoint; pretty much everyone looked as they did…or at least as much as they could, considering the simplistic art style of back then. I heard there were some…issues…over in Japan that the main character and his family weren’t portrayed as being of Japanese descent, but honestly, the characters in the original story were very much western in appearance and personality in many ways. This sort of complaining is better reserved for when you get shit like the live action Street Fighter movie…it’s legitimate there. In fact, in some instances the characters were almost too perfect. Take Trixie, for example, who was played by Christina Ricci so spot on that I had this nearly irresistible desire to tear her clothes off and…well, you get the idea. A far cry from her days as Wednesday Adams to be sure…this girl WAS Trixie brought to wonderful glorious life for every drooling fanboy to ogle. Yes, I do know that gets me put on the restraining order list. All I can say is, take a number, get in line…I seriously expect to wind up on Bettina Bush’s restraining order list far sooner, heh.

Much of the anime quirks were kept intact in the movie. I saw shoujo sparklies (I have to admit laughing my ass off when I saw these), speed lines, cheesy fight scenes and scene wipes, and…you know, there was just a lot of these. Don’t think I saw any sweat drops, but I could be mistaken there. Also, there were quite a few digs at the original dub, both subtle and gross. It’s not like the original dub didn’t deserve it either; so be prepared, you’ll know them when you see them, and yes, they’re exactly what you think they are which is why I mentioned them at all.

Overall execution of the story is pretty spot on for a Speed Racer-ish type of story. I admit, it’s been so long since I’ve actually sat down and watched it, that I couldn’t begin to tell you if the story itself is analogous to an actual storyline or not. However, what I do recall from those days long ago, this fits in the very spirit of what the story (racing and fighting cheaters and criminals) was about. Certainly the racing scenes were executed flawlessly, and to the point of nearly driving me out of my seat in a full on adrenaline powered run. While the mechanics of the race were updated to reflect what could be done with modern CGI, the pulse pounding adrenaline rush this movie gives you is everything the manga and anime delivered so long ago, that alone gives it some serious credit for staying true to the source. Hell, I don’t think there’s one fan alive (or anyone really) that could have walked out of there without their heart pounding faster than the drum beats of a Gackt song. Fuck, I was so wired, I wound up screaming like a football fan at the movie’s climax (and I don’t even like professional racing, heh). I wasn’t the only one, which surprised me after I calmed down enough to review my actions.

If you’re an anime fan of any sort, chances are you’re going to love this movie. If there’s a kid inside you, you’re going to want to see this movie at least two or three times. This movie is a lot of fun, and so true to its roots that only most die hard of the die hardest fans wouldn’t find the least bit of enjoyment out of it (and even that might be stretching things). Overall, this is exactly what children everywhere dream of when we see our cartoons on the T.V. Walking into the screen and playing with the characters we’ve been watching all this time, and that’s really what this movie’s all about. I don’t know if this erases some of the shit the Wachowski brothers pulled in “The Matrix” and “V for Vendetta,” but, if nothing else, it’s a pretty decent start.