SPEED RACER is the most audaciously brilliant film I've seen this year. It takes the adjectives "bright, loud, and colorful" and turns them into peaks to be scaled, climbing ever higher to some brighter, louder, more colorful future. The story itself can fit on the back of a cocktail napkin: "S.R. saves family. Drives real fast." But the Wachowskis' execution of that story is so joyfully over the top that it won me over. The images flash by so quickly that the brain barely has time to process them beyond "Bang! Zoom! Pretty Colors!" However, when your movie's racing by at these speeds, flashing images and a cocktail napkin plot is all you need.
Is this a film for the ADD crowd? Perhaps so - the cuts are so quick, the action so frenetic, that I'm not sure I want to show it to my kids. But it's beautiful, in its way, and it's daring. In crafting SPEED RACER, the Wachowskis made something unlike any film that has gone before it. Even if you're not easily distracted by bright, shiny objects, you've got to respect the filmmakers' vision and daring.
SPEED RACER is easily my biggest surprise of the year.
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