"Super" Speed?

I couldn’t find a fractal that was a literal representation of Speed Racer so instead I decided to pick one that expressed how the movie made me feel Hence I give you--Shock Storm! (No, the movie isn’t shocking but it is a sensory assault so I thought it worked.) You’ll just have to read on to find out what I meant . . .
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Speed Racer first arrived on these shores from Japan in 1967 and quickly became an “Anime” cult-classic. Forty years later it made the jump to the big screen thanks to Andy and Larry Wachowki--the team behind The Matrix trilogy. They managed to capture the look of the cartoon with amazing similarities while simultaneously taking the combo of animation and live action to a whole new level never seen on screen before.
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And rest assured--Speed Racer is all about the look. It is worth the price of admission just to see the racing sequences (which gleefully defying the Laws of Physics and straining credibility.) The seamless combination of live-action and animation is something that really needs to be seen on a big screen to be believed and appreciated. Even the sets have this candy-colored and fantastic yet fully-realized “reto-future look that should be recognized come Oscar time.
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And then there’s the script . . .
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The plot is frankly cartoonish but, considering the source material. It works quite nicely. Emile Hirsch as Speed isn’t given a lot to work with but he looks the part and serves the role well. Christina Ricci (Trixie) gets to fly a pretty pink helicopter and wear a lot of miniskirts but nothing else. John Goodman (the perfect real-life embodiment of “Pops: Racer) plays gruff but loveable while Susan Sarandon gets to play the perfect “Mom.” Matthew Fox (from Lost) gets to show off his Ninja skills as the mysterious Racer X (and if you don‘t know who he REALLY is you probably shouldn‘t see this movie!) Spritle, Chim-Chim and Sparky (why is he an Austarilain?) also makes an appearance. Roger Allam (who I thought was Tim Curry from The Rocky Horror Picture Show) gleefully chews the scenery as arch-villan Royalton. The cast is HUGE and multi-ethnic--all of whom look pretty amazing.
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Clocking in at a little over two hours, the movies tends to drag in places (and sags horribly in the middle.) The directors could have shortened up or completely eliminated most of the “talky” scenes and the movie wouldn’t have suffered. The cast is so big and the story so sprawling sometimes it gets hard to tell the Players without a Score Card: there are also a few situations which will leave the viewer scratching their heads going “huh?”. Still, the movie is completely enjoyable in any case.
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Speed Racer is a wonderful summer flick: check your brain at the door and enjoy the eye candy. Fans of the original show will enjoy the movie and animation fans in general will probably like it as well. It isn’t for fans of romantic comedies or serious movies but adults can go with children that the whole family can enjoy.
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FINAL GRADE: B-