On the fast track to oblivion

09/05/2008 

YOUNG acting stars Emile Hirsch and Christina Ricci usually throw their weight behind small, independent movies, so what are they doing in Speed Racer, a loud, brash, funfair ride of a summer blockbuster? Making a fast buck?

This is brothers Larry and Andy Wachowski’s first writing-directing effort since The Matrix trilogy. Not content with making lesbian thrillers (does anyone remember Bound?), they have plumped for a computer-animated version of the TV cartoon series Speed Racer.

CACOPHONY OF DRIVING SOUNDS

Imagine a cuddly, PG-rated feature-length version of the video game Grand Theft Auto. Their longtime producing partner Joel Silver insists: “Speed Racer is for everybody.” That is, everybody who can endure a blur of computer generated imagery and a cacophony of driving sounds for an epic two hours and 15 minutes.

Hirsch — who last year played the lead in Sean Penn’s Into The Wild — is Speed, a young racing phenomenon who gets behind the wheel to take on a corrupt corporate honcho ruining motor sport by fixing races. Driven by the legacy of his late brother Rex (Scott Porter) who died behind the wheel, he climbs into his Mach 5 (no, not the razor) for some racing high jinks.

Ricci is cast in the thankless role of his girlfriend, Trixie, who scouts out the racecourse from her helicopter. Susan Sarandon (another weird bit of casting) and John Goodman play Speed’s mom and pop, appearing alongside a pet chimpanzee that’s always getting into trouble. It’s that stupid.

The Wachowskis have a cloth-ear for dialogue and there’s no room for character development. Someone said the experience of watching it is like being trapped in Las Vegas, but it’s worse — it’s more like being stuck in a games arcade in Skegness with all the screens flashing and bleeping.

The best thing that can be said for it is that there are some special effects which, although they’re very accomplished, you’ll only appreciate if you’re an anime enthusiast and haven’t already developed a migraine from the video-action painting. It’s probably not the worse film you’ll ever see but it’s pretty bad.

HONEYDRIPPER (Cert: PG)

Independent film guru and liberal iconoclast John Sayles (Lone Star and Silver Star) journeys into the early days of R&B, a forgotten era of American music between the end of the Second World War and the advent of rock ’n’ roll to produce a wholesome, if slightly predictable, story.

It’s 1950 and Tyrone Purvis (a charismatic turn from Danny Glover ), once a wellknown blues piano player, is the proprietor of a struggling blues bar in rural Alabama called the Honeydripper Lounge. To save his bar, he organises a concert starring hit radio artist Guitar Sam.

Meanwhile, Sonny Blake (Gary Clark Jr), a young, guitar playing stranger, drifts into town and soon after is arrested for vagrancy by the white sheriff (Stacy Keach). African-Americans are still the underclass and little reason is needed to lock up the “coloured folk”.

However, when Sam fails to show up at the train station, Tyrone seeks out Sonny to step into the breach (it’s before TV, so no one knows what Samlooks like anyway). It turns out that Sonny is not just a regular guitar player, he’s a visionary, and he’s built himself an electric guitar to rock the town. For one night, the Honeydripper bar plays its part in rock ’n’ roll history.

Soon after, big bands give way to small groups, and rural communities get electricity, so electric guitars replace pianos, saxophones and acoustic harmonicas.

AFRICAN-AMERICAN

It’s rather slow to get going but Sayles’s film is rich with characters (there are so many great performances from the largely African-American cast) and flowing with music. The director’s long-term collaborator, composer Mason Daring, has seamlessly incorporated several original songs alongside the soundtrack’s period tunes.

The music is joyful, the kind that brings people to their feet, and it occurs in energetic outbursts which puncture the film’s prevailing quiet and moody atmosphere. Those who are patient through the longueurs will be rewarded with a rousing finale.

ALSO OUT THIS WEEKEND

Morgan Spurlock, the stunt documentarian of Supersize Me fame obviously got a little big for his boots after crusading against McDonald’s. He now tackles the war on terrorism by asking: Where In The World Is Osama Bin Laden? This self-indulgent film delivers little that is surprising or intelligent, least of all the whereabouts of the infamous leader of Al Qaeda.

Cameron Diaz plays a highly-strung woman dumped by her boyfriend alongside Ashton Kutcher as a fun-loving womaniser who separately venture to Las Vegas and wind up drunk, married and the winners of a $3m slotmachine jackpot. No, it’s not the story of Britney Spears, but the latest inane rom-com, What Happened In Vegas.

Messy post-apocalyptic thriller Doomsday sees a team of soldiers in the near future infiltrate quarantined Scotland so they can find a cure for a deadly virus. British director Neil Marshall who won plaudits for Dog Soldiers somehow managed to persuade Bob Hoskins to front this umpteenth killer-virus movie.

From the maker of the Oscar-winning Closely Watched Trains, Czech director Jiri Menzel, comes I Served The King Of England, the tale of a waiter’s dreams of wealth in the 1930s following Hitler’s devouring of Europe.

Argentinean drama XXY focuses on a young hermaphrodite who quits the hormone pills which have maintained an appearance of femininity. Lavish, CGI-drenched Vexille explores a future Japan which has developed biotechnology and robotics capable of extending human life.

Manufactured Landscapes is the striking new documentary on the world and work of renowned artist Edward Burtynsky. Internationally acclaimed for his large-scale photographs of “manufactured landscapes” — quarries, recycling yards, factories, mines and dams.

By Johanna Thomas-Corr