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The Wachowski brothers co-wrote 2005’s V for Vendetta, but they haven’t directed a film since 2003’s The Matrix Revolutions. Even though I was aware of their love for Anime, I hadn’t expected their next project to be writing and directing a film based on a campy, low-budget Japanese television series about car racing. They transformed that concept into a remarkably vivid riot of color, a video game on steroids, a CGI world populated by simple characters with simple aspirations. Never filmmakers afraid of the risks of excess, Speed Racer was made for an estimated one hundred twenty million dollars, and, unlike the wildly popular Matrix franchise, the film earned less than half of its production costs at the box office. This is less a film and more an assault on the visual and, to a lesser extent, aural senses. Nostalgic viewers expecting to experience anything that faintly resembles the television series are in for a shock. And yet, this seems to be a film custom made for the impressively wider color palette of high definition. It’s almost hypnotic.

Speed Racer (Emile Hirsch) is actually the title character; I was unaware that the family name was Racer and the middle son was named Speed. He lives with his father, Pops (John Goodman), Mom (Susan Sarandon), an annoyingly mischievous younger brother named Spritle (Paulie Litt) and his pet chimpanzee Chim Chim (Kenzie and Willy). The extended family includes auto mechanic Sparky (Kick Gurry) and Speed’s main squeeze, Trixie (Christina Ricci).

Mom is the quintessential ‘50s mother, keeping house and putting her famous pancakes laced with hints of vanilla and cinnamon on the table. Pops runs the family business, which is racing. He and Sparky design and fabricate race cars to compete in what has evolved into a brutal contact sport with lots of silly spins and four-wheel drifting. Pop shut the family business down for a while as they grieved the loss in a fiery crash of the eldest son, Rex Racer (Scott Porter), whose encapsulating foam crash system failed. When Pops recovered and decided to get back into racing, Speed, who never wanted to do anything else with his life, became the driver.

Speed is so good that he attracts the attention of a rich automotive industrialist named E. P. Arnold Royalton (Roger Allam). He attempts to seduce Speed and his family into partnering with his racing team and he makes a generous offer. But when Speed comes to understand the risks of losing the Racer family’s independence and he turns down the offer, Royalton reveals his true colors. He threatens to destroy the Racers through patent litigation. Royalton claims that all racing is fixed, that he and other industrialists are in control, and that winning races doesn’t matter. It’s his company’s stock price that matters. But the Racers have a mysterious ally. Racer X (Matthew Fox) is both a skillful driver in his own car and a crime fighter with a raspy Batman voice and dressed in a black version of Daredevil’s leathers. What follows is the drama of not one but two desperate races to defeat the forces of evil, vindicate competitive racing, and save the Racer family from financial ruin.

With hyperactive editing, fast cuts, simulated handheld camera techniques, and relentlessly fast motion that is more often just a blur, Speed Racer challenges the senses. The colors are hyper-real. I don’t think there was a single frame of film in which there wasn’t vivid color at the edge of iridescence. Even something as simple as a close-up of Christina Ricci was punctuated with impossibly red lips. Reds dominate, but blues, greens, yellows, and purples permeate the visuals. And leave your understanding of physics at the door; these cars simply don’t play by the rules of this universe.

Speed Racer has a simple but respectable plot that’s wrapped in dazzling visuals and hyperkinetic pacing that’s both distracting and oddly mesmerizing. This must be what Attention Deficit Disorder must be like.

The Video: How Does The Disc Look?

The film’s theatrical aspect ratio of 2.40:1 is presented in a remarkable high definition transfer compressed with the VC-1 video CODEC. Small object detail is outstanding; I was impressed with the visual density of thousands of spectators visible in the race stands. The chroma is absolutely amazing. The eye candy pushes beyond the boundaries of believable color without going over the edge into phosphorescence. It’s a delicate balance. I was left with the impression of animation brought to life; perhaps that’s what the Wachowski brothers had in mind. Video dynamic range is very good, but there was some black crush that limited shadow detail. This, too, may have been intended, since the contrast seems to be quite hot. Where the transfer does not deliver is in finely grained textures. Fabric weaves and imperfections in skin are slightly suppressed. But this, too, could be attributed to the Wachowski brothers’ intent to create a live action cartoon; such textures would be more film-like than cartoon-like.

The Audio: How Does The Disc Sound?

Alas, there are no lossless tracks on this Blu-ray Disc. The primary audio track is in Dolby Digital 5.1. The track is reasonably immersive. Enable EX for the best surround experience. As you might expect, cars zooming by evoke surround action, and crashes spread debris in all directions. Deep bass is present, and it’s suitably impressive. There is a fair share of explosions and raucous car exhaust notes; the bottom end adds gravitas. Michael Giacchino’s orchestral score, occasionally tapping into themes from the original television show, fares best. The instruments have a pleasing sound and are spread across a broad soundstage enhanced with leaks into the surrounds. Sound effects have pleasing visceral impacts. Dialog is distortion-free throughout, but lacks the transparency in timbre found in lossless tracks.

The alternative languages are in French, Spanish, and Portuguese, all presented in Dolby Digital 5.1. The optional subtitles are in English SDH, French, Spanish, and Portuguese.

The Supplements: What Goodies Are There?

Speed Racer: Car Fu featurette (27:38, non-anamorphic widescreen, SD) explains that the Wachowski brothers were inspired by the original Speed Racer Anime television series. The short concentrates on the choreography of the races and the artistic nature of the CGI. The intent was to capture the feel of the original Anime but bring it up to date with a hyper-real approach. The animators discuss the design of the cars to maintain some level of believability. The silly extreme sports approach to the races is quite intentional. Of personal interest was learning that rally cars have more than three pedals; I had no idea that a higher level of control was built in. We get to see the construction of non-functional car props, the creation of previz, and the artistic decisions that helped emulate Anime. Of particular note is the emulation of multi-plane animation, even for live action. Interesting stuff.

Spritle in the Big Leagues featurette (14:34, non-anamorphic widescreen, SD) puts the spotlight on the second most annoying character in the film (the chimp was number one). The premise is that the young actor is bored and he explores the film’s sets in Berlin while taking us along for a tour. The short is punctuated with text factoids. Of only modest interest.

Speed Racer: Supercharged! (15:43, non-anamorphic widescreen, SD) is a nice little featurette that describes the nature of the various cars found in the film and the imaginative engines that power them. Cute and a little silly.

Warner has included a Digital Copy DVD for your portable pleasure. There is also included a third disc, a DVD Bonus Game that allows the viewer to control his or her car using the remote control’s cursor keys. This one is definitely for the younger set.

The 135-minute film is organized into thirty chapters.

Final Thoughts

Despite my carping about the juvenile nature of the film and its excesses, when it ended, I was unaware that I had just spent two and a quarter hours in my theater seat. I suppose that’s testimony to the Wachowski brothers’ ability to engage. An odd but dazzling presentation, a few modest supplements, and two extra discs for portable copies and a game for the youngsters round out this release.