Movie Review: Speed Racer

So this is what the ADD instant-gratification kids are into these days.

Starring Emile Hirsch, Christina Ricci, John Goodman, Susan Sarandon, Matthew Fox, and Richard Roundtree. Directed by the Wachowski Brothers.

When I was growing up, I watched "He-Man," "Transformers," and "G.I. Joe;" I was a kid of the Eighties. That being said, I had never watched the 1960's cartoon "Speed Racer," until I was much older and discontent with the latter-90's cartoon offerings. With it having been released on DVD I watched a little of it with my younger brother and trust me, it didn't take much speed to catch onto "Racer." But I digress.

This movie's (and I stress this is a movie, not film) storyline is this: Speed(Hirsch) is a racecar-obsessed kid living in a Technicolor world that looks like "Willy Wonka" on steroids. His childhood love Trixie (Ricci) helped him through high school and is his best friend/ love interest. After winning a race he's visited by Corporate Owner Royalton (Roger Allam), your quintessential villainous "I can buy your existence" kinda guy, who makes an offer to Speed that unless Speed signs for him, his entire family and life are in jeopardy. This doesn't bode well with Speed or his dad Pops (Goodman), Mom (Sarandon), his younger brother Spritle (Paulie Litt) or chimp Chim-Chim. Speed is approached by the infamous Racer X (Fox) and Taejo (Rain) to compete in the Casa Christo, the race of thieves, thugs, lowlifes and the desperate; it's also the race where Speed's brother was killed. Will Speed win it and go on to the Casa Grande, THE race where he can win a $1 million prize and show-up Royalton? Who is Racer X?

Now that I've gotten that out of the way, while I watched the movie the main question going on inside my head was: how do I review this thing. It's not cheesy. It's not boring. It's not bad. Unfortunately, it's not great, either. What settled in my head was this thought: there is a road between genius and madness, and this movie rips across it with reckless abandon.