lol

I didn't think it 'balanced' itself well. heh

I could have loved it, but I didn't think the visuals were quite what I wished for. And the story felt disjointed to me.

Oh well, I still love the Matrix movies and V.

I don't get the hate for this film; in fact, the first time I saw it, I wanted to see it again. I went back to the theater the next day and saw it again. Despite its pretty thin storyline, the visuals are absolutely breathtaking, the characters are great, and I loved the childhood atmosphere to the film. I was an avid watcher of Speed Racer when I was little, and this is a great treat. It might have just cracked my top 10 films of all-time. Seriously.

A+

Just bought this on Blu-Ray ($7!). It's even better than I remembered. Fantastic!

Wow, colour me surprised.
This was an amazing experience of a film, fun and over the top to such a crazy degree.
I had initially tried to watch it a year or two ago but stopped 15 minutes into it and never desired to see it again.
But, I'd nothing better to do, thought why the hell not, and here we are.
I wish it had done better because this is more fun than 90% of the movies released each year.
The colours were also so wacky and each scene so stunning, if only I'd seen this in the cinema or on a HDTV!

I watched it again tonight.

It's totally one of the most visually inventive, expressive, and excessive films of the last decade. Perhaps longer. The Wachowskis knew exactly what they were doing here and it just fucking works.

The kid didn't even bother me this time. He completely fits within the tone of the film.

One of the most criminally overlooked films of the last decade.

I cannot describe how happy I am that my eight year-old brother and sister have latched onto this movie. They've probably watched it over a dozen times, ever since I took them to theaters back in 2008 to show it to them. This movie gets better on repeat viewings... But some of the older, more cynical people I've shown it to did not get the appeal. At all.

I think that Speed Racer is a classic because it manages to be so damn earnest even though the visuals and the sweeps and other editing tricks are so wildly impressive.

Speed Racer is an excellent example of anti-hype.

When it was released, the corporate media shat all over it (38% @ RT) and of course the proles obediently listened to the propaganda and it ended up with $43m DOM + $50m OS for a total of $93m WW.

What could have caused this backlash from our transnational overlords? Was it the success of The Matrix franchise? Was it the ambiguous sexuality of the directors? Whatever it was, it put a damper on the Wachowski Brothers' talent for five years - - although thankfully they're decloaking this year for their directorial return with Cloud Atlas.

Fortunately, the effects of anti-hype have started to wear off and people are opening their eyes to the magnificent filmic treasure that is Speed Racer!

It's interesting the German wanted to bulldoze the child and his friend. Perhaps to push them into a large hole filled with many other children and their friends? This could be a viable "solution."

It still sucks.

Boo, I love this movie so much.

Still easily one of my favorite movies ever.

Speed Racer

Well I finally watched it and the claim that it's ahead of its time is rubbish. It borrows heavily from, among others, The Cat in the Hat, Cars, Space Jam, Spy Kids 3D: Gameover, and the original Batman TV series (and to a lesser degree, even Death Race 2000). It's like a hundreds 'n' thousands sprinkled lollipop full of rainbows and speed, and dripped in pop art and comicbook sauce, then layered with Rowntrees colours and Disney branding. It's a crazy-ass ride.

The visual effects are nothing special, and nothing that I hadn't already seen 5 years earlier in the third Spy Kids movie, especially the racing scenes. The whole movie was obviously shot on a green screen, and wasn't hidden very well. Half-way through I was actually bored. The story is quite bad actually, and Emile Hirsch continues his bad movie streak. But Yu Nan and Christina Ricci are so, so, so, so, so hot that I was happy to keep watching. And John Goodman is the cool too. There were a few glimpses of good cinematography, but ultimately the film looks cheap due to its reliance on green screen and inability to hide it.

This is The Wachowski Brother's worst film by far.

D

Thanks for your review.

I don't think they were trying to hide the green screen at all. It's pretty obvious that these people are living in a cartoon. That's a big part of the appeal.

Trying or not, it made it look tacky and cheap.

I still enjoy the hell out of this movie. It's silly, overstuffed, and not-at-all-subtle, but the hyper, everything-but-the-kitchen-sink approach that the Wachowskis take is exactly why it works. A more serious approach just would have made the concept look even dumber.

Rewatched this for the first time since its release. I expected to come out of it saying things like "if it had released a few years later, after the rise of 3D and return of the Furious franchise, it would have done a lot better." But no, it wouldn't have. The contrasting tone of the movie would have alienated audiences no matter which decade it opened in. You've got the main story which is like The Matrix with racing, but it is always being interupted by the shenanigans of the kid and his pet chimp. The Wachowskis always did have a bad habit of looking down on their audience, and these "for the kiddies" scenes are as cynical as it gets.

That being said, I still love this movie! The visual aesthetic looks so amazing in 4k ultra high definition. Barely any of the CG looks dated since it was such a trippy experience to begin with. And I really don't mind the kiddy stuff since his delivery is always on point. If anything, I think the villain is the weakest part and the role should have gone to somebody not so obviously evil. Whatever though, I'm glad this movie was able to get made with such a massive budget even if it did go down as one of historys biggest flops.

8.8/10