I was never really enamored of the original Speed Racer series, which I caught a few times when MTV aired late-night reruns back in the early ’90s. I was willing to give this a shot with the understanding that, come what may, whatever the Wachowskis would devise wouldn’t be boring.

The setup intersperses the requisite introductory action scene with childhood flashbacks of an undisciplined wannabe speedster and an endless parade of talking heads that slide left and right across the screen like shooting-gallery ducks while spouting plot points in soundbite punditry format. The sample race sets the tone for all the races in the film, and looks largely like a set of decorative Hot Wheel tracks. The cars have smoothly humming engines, often sound weightless when they land after even the most aerodynamic tumbles, and drift across long stretches of roadway more quickly than they accelerate.

Lest any of this come across as too frivolous, Speed’s family is one riddled with tragedy: his older brother Rex left the family in disgrace to become his own driver, only to backslide on his racing ethics much to his family’s dismay before his apparent explosive demise during a fierce competition. This burden weighs heavily on Our Hero as he’s courted by a dead-on Tim Curry impersonator whose giant-sized company wants him to be their latest tool. (My favorite visual gag is the corporate logo of the villainous Royalton Industries, which is shaped exactly like “®”…and, of course is itself a registered trademark with the mandatory ® proudly superscripted above the full-size ®.) When Speed chooses family goodness over corporate toadying, Faux-Curry reveals the Truth: auto racing is fixed! Betrayed by sports, Our Hero sets out to tip the scales and make it otherwise.

Much of the film rings true to me. Emile Hirsch plays Speed as undistilled pureness of heart, with unblemished facial features that efficiently convey his straightforward, uncomplicated emotions like a series of skilled animation cels — especially when his required emotion is grim racing determination. His furrowed brow, clenched frown, and unwavering stare are all about WIN WIN WIN WIN WIN. John Goodman is a surprisingly effective Pops Racer who has his rigorous personal standards and his high expectations for his kids, but he’s just as likely to reveal an unexpected level of warmth and affection as he is to explode with cartoon anger. As with most action films, the womenfolk suffer from underwritten characters, but Susan Sarandon and Christina Ricci make the most of sheer presence.

One of the major handicaps is Speed’s little brother Spritle, the pudgy comic relief every live-action kids’ film is required to insert by law. Naturally he disobeys his elders, annoys his brother, overdoses on candies when given the chance, and — as soon as he’s inserted into a fight scene — naturally masters the cinematic art of the groin kick. His pet monkey Chim-Chim likewise performs his monkey duties to the fullest extent of his eminent monkeyness. The Wizard Magazine staff will be delighted to know that yes, feces is flung.

Some of the supporting cast is just as noteworthy. Benno Fürmann (whom I liked years ago in the German film The Princess and the Warrior) makes an overdue transition to American film as Inspector Detector, the friendy officer type who facilitates the movie’s tenuous connections between its racing sequences and its glum international intrigue. As the enigmatic Racer-X, Matthew Fox lowers his voice an octave and eliminates that wavering that bugs me in everything else of his that I’ve seen. And in a role that deserved to be expanded to all the races in the film, Richard Roundtree has himself a ball as an enthusiastic commentator.

Several parts of the movie detract from any attempts at a cohesive whole. My attention wandered whenever the gangster subplot took over, especially the jarringly out-of-place torture scene. (Don’t get me started on their use of hoary piranha clichés.) The martial arts sequences just beg for unfair Matrix comparisons. One overlong, overcrowded fight scene literally brings one race to a halt for several minutes, then resumes with nary a concern. I’d love to have the kind of car that can start a race and gain a substantial enough lead that I could pause for a half-hour lunch break and still take the checkered flag.

And there are all those racing scenes, the ostensible meat of the movie. The TV ads for Warren Beatty’s Dick Tracy included a blurb from Owen Gleiberman’s review for Entertainment Weekly: “A lavishly eye-popping Day-Glo extravaganza!” The TV ads failed to mention that wasn’t a compliment, and that Gleiberman graded the movie a C.

The racing scenes reminded me of just that. The nonstop radioactive ROY G BIV scintillation is the complete diametric opposite of the harsh green-’n'-black Matrix palette. The action blurs faster than the eye can see, often more quickly than the computer can distinctly animate, reminding me in unflattering ways of the Boonta Eve podrace. Speed lines, blatant defiance of physics, and surprise daydream action segments echo the original source material in ways that may or may not affect your enjoyment depending on your own anime tolerance level.

The section of the Casa Cristo race set in the desert comes closest to achieving that level of successful testosterone ballet that made The Matrix and the fourteen-minute highway sequence in The Matrix Reloaded such essential male viewing. For those few moments, I could feel the weight of the cars, the impact of their illegal weaponry, and the damage inflicted by metal on metal. I wish I could heap specific praise upon whichever of the 327 different animation studios listed in the end credits was most responsible for that sequence.

After a long chain of random careening auto explosions, the final Grand Prix eventually eschews representational art altogether and concludes with a climactic feat of impressionism that doesn’t really show you a dramatic race victory, it suggests one with Pavlovian audio-visual stimuli. Perhaps it’s the final, most diabolical step in the Wachowskis’ plan — implementing the Ludovico technique to convince audiences This Whole Movie Was Exciting!

I can’t wait to see that last part as a TV blurb.

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