While steel-plated cars bristling with firepower are guaranteed to get adolescent hearts stirring, the movie offers myriad pleasures for adults.
Comment
08/22/08
Death Race (2008)
43
%
Tomatometer
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Reviews Counted:143
Fresh:61
Rotten:82
Average Rating:4.8/10
Consensus: Mindless, violent, and lightning-paced, Death Race is little more than an empty action romp.
Theatrical Release:Aug 22, 2008 Wide
Box Office: $36,064,910
Synopsis: The Roger Corman-produced cult favorite DEATH RACE 2000 (1975) gets an update in this reworking from action director Paul W.S. Anderson (RESIDENT EVIL). In a role sure to please fans of his work in... [More]
Starring: Jason Statham, Joan Allen, Tyrese Gibson, Ian McShane
Director: Paul W.S. Anderson
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Reviews for Death Race
The discombobulated violence that ensues is nihilistic, gratuitous and numb-skulled -- perfect for an action fossil that, despite its near-future setting, is all pre-CGI, pre-eco-friendly horsepower.
08/22/08
Car-crash porn for the modern audience.
08/22/08
This remake of Roger Corman's camp classic spackles enough blood and burnt rubber into the gaping plot holes it's easy to ignore them until the ride home.
08/22/08
Despite all of the action, fists, gunfire, explosions and more, it ends up just driving in circles, constantly banging into the uninspired barriers of mediocrity before crashing in a heap of bad filmmaking.
08/22/08
It has the tough guy lead, dozens of mad car crack-ups, tons of gratuitous violence, sweaty B-movie appeal, and even a couple of A-talent actors, but in the end Death Race runs around in circles.
08/22/08
What plot exists here is so nonsensical, so hackneyed that it doesn't deserve or need explanation.
08/22/08
What fans of the original will immediately glean from the quasi-remake, now simply titled Death Race, is just how prophetic Bartel's film was … and how desperately the new film needs its forebear's sense of irony.
08/22/08
The movie gets its own Mad Max mojo working, but there's no real attempt at social commentary here -- these churls just want to have fun.
08/22/08
If you like primitive, degrading mayhem, this will fulfill your needs.
08/22/08
Thanks to its character interplay, the movie doesn't drag despite taking a good 40 minutes to really rev its engines. And the racing that ensues is as loud, fast, hyper-edited, and pulverizingly destructive as the gladiatorially minded would hope.
08/22/08
Blood, gore. Unlimited machine gun and cannon fire. Bombs exploding. Tires screeching, brakes squealing glass breaking, crash, after meaningless crash. What's not to like?
08/22/08
In movies like The Bank Job, Jason Statham has shown the potential to be a British Steve McQueen, but he'll never get the chance if he keeps making gobblers like Death Race.
08/22/08
This is still summer trash and no brain cells were injured or even fatigued in the making of it.
08/22/08
Top CriticOnce upon a time, car chases were a highlight of any serious action movie (come back, George Miller!); here they are its entire substance...
08/22/08
DEATH RACE is helmed by Paul (insert random alphabet letters) Anderson. He putzed a few of the Alien movies and still thinks he can pull off an action film.
08/22/08
Even though the original film was made more than 30 years ago on a short schedule and a miniscule budget, its scenes of car-based carnage are actually more exciting and cinematically inventive than the messes on display here.
08/22/08
...it doesn't bore, and it doesn't embarrass the actors who appear in it. For a late summer action flick, that's high praise indeed.
08/22/08
As hard as metal and just as dumb, Paul W.S. Anderson's Death Race couldn't be further from producer Roger Corman and director Paul Bartel's goofy, bloody 1975 original, Death Race 2000.
08/22/08
Top CriticYes, Death Race is as brutal as a punch in the face. If you have a hankering for B-movie grime and gore, it can also be a lot of fun.
08/22/08
Top CriticLatest News for Death Race
January 03, 2009:
Social commentary on greed and war along with sexed up female con backseat drivers, is thin pretext for the incessant, at times visually surreal heavy metal havoc orgy of war machine, napalm shooting designer macho-mobile boy toy vehicular homicide. 
More...
December 28, 2008:
Social commentary on greed and war along with sexed up female con backseat drivers, is thin pretext for the incessant, at times visually surreal heavy metal havoc orgy of war machine, napalm shooting designer macho-mobile boy toy vehicular homicide.
More...
September 26, 2008:
Exclusive: David Carradine Cameo in Crank 2 says Statham
It's not just Death Race that boasts a cameo from legend David Carradine. According to star Jason Statham, speaking to RT this week ahead of the UK release of Death Race, the... More...
September 26, 2008:
RT Interview: Jason Statham Chats Death Race, Crank 2 and The Sweeney
RT catches up with Jason Statham to learn more about the Death Race and grill him on upcoming turns in Crank 2, Transporter 3 and the possibility of an appearance in Nick Love's... More...
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