BoardChiri Bad Acting and worse Bad Screenplay

Casey Duggan It’s sentimental, ridiculously long and only occasionally funny

Kayden This is a dark and sometimes deeply uncomfortable drama

Francene Odetta It's simply great fun, a winsome film and an occasionally over-the-top luxury fantasy that never flags.

joshuajshepard 2 hours I will never get back. Heart filling story, I don't see how when they walked out of the editing room they thought they had done something good.

fredlondi The animated "Speed Racer" is one of the most notoriously silly and corny cartoons ever conceived. The characters are two-dimensional, the plots are little more than "win the race, defeat the villain," and the English dubs are so notoriously hilarious that they've been mocked in everything from "Family Guy" to "Dexter's Laboratory."It was surprising, then, that the live action "Speed Racer" was so needlessly complicated. First, the audience is expected to understand the difference between an "off-road race," for which the Mach 5 can be used, and some fantastical loop-de-loop superspeedways, where the Mach 5 is apparently too out-of-date, replaced by a "Mach 6." What's strange is that the Mach 6 isn't introduced as a replacement to the Mach 5 - in fact, the Mach 6 is destroyed early in the film, then completely rebuilt. I don't understand why this couldn't have been done with the Mach 5 instead. The Mach 5 stands as the most important character in the original cartoon. All of the aforementioned characters are merely a means of showing off its awesomeness. The film should've done the same, not brush it off as a relic compared to the Mach 6.Second, the villain's plot is entirely too dense - even by modern Anime standards. Something about stocks, and corporations fielding drivers with the specific intent of making their companies more money, yet somehow not caring about racing. Something about helping another guy get money for his company. I couldn't honestly tell you what the story should've been about. Why not just do the same thing the cartoon did: bad guy wants to win a race, Speed needs to beat him. The complexity would've been restricted to the characters themselves, which would've been fine. They're basically blank slates from the cartoon - just make them more interesting.The underlying hilarity behind the film's complexity as that the film itself yearns for simplicity. One of the film's best scenes is where Pops Racer recalls a night where he and a young Speed start cheering at a race they're watching on TV. On top of this, the effects are just dreadful. Like "Phantom Menace"-tier. One of the first shots is Rex Racer standing in front of the Mach 5, and you can tell he's just some guy in an empty room leaning against a green-painted rectangle. The action sequences feel like Hot Wheels commercials - certainly not a coincidence given the company marketed the film. There's also no grit, no teeth, no consequence to the action. The spectacular crashes and explosions from the cartoon are dulled by a ridiculous safety feature where drivers are launched to safety in foam cocoons. At least that's what seemed to happen - the CGI battles are so fast and overwhelming that it's hard to tell what's happening.On top of this, the character designs are awful. Why was Snake Oiler turned from some mysterious guy in a black suit with ridiculous glasses into some drunk leather-clad cowboy?What almost singlehandedly saves the film is Matthew Fox, who plays Racer X. My goodness, he absolutely owned that part. While Emile Hirsch was brought on just because he looked like Speed Racer, Fox took on the role of Racer X and quite literally became him. He carries himself with such tortured seriousness that every moment he's on screen is just golden. Watch a supercut of his scenes and you'll enjoy it.As for the rest of the film? Meh. Couldn't help but be disappointed, and this is from someone who watches actual racing. Make no mistake, there's real passion behind the making of this film, and it's clear a lot of work was put into it. I'll take that over some rubber-stamped superhero film any day. I just wish more of that effort was used in the script, character design, and effects. It's just frustrating because one more revision of the script before shooting could've saved it.

Eric Stevenson I admit to never having seen the original "Speed Racer" anime, but from what I heard, this is quite faithful to it. It's weird how that was an anime quite big for its day, but it seems like nowadays it's all but forgotten. We have tons of better mainstream anime now. Anyway, I think my favorite part of this movie was probably John Goodman as Pops. He really is a good actor. There's this odd twist near the end and I guess it's at least unexpected but doesn't make that much sense.I think this did well with fans of the show. I'm glad it wasn't something completely shameless like "Dragonball: Evolution". The worst part was probably how ridiculous the CGI looked. It seemed like it would have made more sense to just make this a full CGI animated movie. The plot seems to go everywhere but it does have some heartfelt scenes and awesome scenes. I've seen a lot of mediocre movies lately. **1/2

Malteser999 Dear Lord, what happened to these guys? From creating a flick that had changed cinema forever to the most nauseating roller coaster ride I've ever been in. If anyone of you are looking forward to see a good (passable) anime adaption, go and pop in Death Note, Oldboy or even Initial D. And I'll tell you why you should be avoiding this garbage.Have I previously mentioned the word "nauseating"? Yea, maybe I'll enjoy this movie more if I had some aspirin on hand. Yes, utilizing a neon color palette sure is a challenge and pretty original in my book. But if two of Nicolas Winning Refyn movies, Only God Forgives & The Neon Demon, can be the polar opposite, why can't you do something similar considering you had 3 TIMES his budget?With all that aside, there are, thankfully, a few "watchable" moments in this entire 2 hour disaster. Speaking of run-time, it wouldn't be that long and presumably entertaining if they just completely erase the two little "animals" (the monkey and that kid I wanted to decapitate). Why would you cut back to these 2 when we're in a middle of a pretty intense conversation? What grotesque species are you.Guess who they can afford with all that truck-sized money. Emile Hirsch. Wow!!! You can get John Goodman, Rain ( a popular Korean star) but picked out an unknown as your main character? But the real reason I was disappointed was the fact his acting chops are as good as a 2 am infomercial host. Trust me, it's that terrible.Sorry, I don't usually express my personal hatred towards films in my reviews. But because I legitimately liked some parts from this movie such as Sir Goodman and Sir Allam's captivating performances. As well as to one of the most heart pounding climax I've seen in a damn long time. I really wished they could've just focus on how can we make a damn good family flick because I loved Disney's Cars. And just in case you are a parent reading this, buy a Blu-Ray copy of Cars rather than feeding your kid this monstrosity.