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News
Speed Racer Cast Promises "Things You've Never Seen Before"
Hirsch, Fox, Ricci say the Wachowskis have got a new bag.
by Jeff Giles | March 25, 2008
Discuss Article
Whether you love it or hate it, when the Wachowski brothers' Speed Racer hits screens on May 9, you'll at least be forced to admit you've never seen anything quite like it.

That's the promise being made by the Speed Racer cast, anyway, in a series of interviews with MTV Movies. The network caught up with stars Emile Hirsch, Christina Ricci, and Matthew Fox at ShoWest, and they all made similar claims -- led by Hirsch, who came right out and said the movie "has all these visuals and elements to it that you've never seen before." Fox later added "It's going to be like nothing you've ever seen before -- really."

So what's so different about this movie, anyway? According to Christina Ricci, the Wachowskis are taking Speed Racer's animated origins seriously:

They're editing this film as though it was a cartoon -- there isn't a film that's been edited in this particular way. They're layering these 2-D images in order to create depth, and that allows you to just sweep one image across the screen, the way that a cartoon does. It allows you to edit in a style that's never been seen before, and they're also using digital effects that no one has seen before. It's just crazy.

Speed Racer producer Joel Silver echoes his stars' comments, telling MTV that even though he's "been working on this for about 15 or 16 years," he's happy for the delay, because "the way the Wachowski brothers made the movie, it never could've been made before." According to Silver, the film's special effects "are being invented pretty much now as we're making them...we couldn't have done what we're doing with these cars before now."

The process, of course, included its own built-in challenges; as Fox puts it, "You're on green screen most of the time, pretty much the whole film. Also, technically, many times you would shoot a scene with other actors and those actors would be removed from the scene, because there's a depth of field, a plane of focus that they're using...It was like learning [how to act] all over again, which was really fun."

To read more of the cast's thoughts on Speed Racer -- including how much of the cartoon's famous cheese factor moviegoers can expect to find on May 9 -- follow the link below!

Source: MTV Movies

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Comments (1-20 of 33 posts) | Reply
SpikesInMySkull
SpikesInMySkull writes:
on Mar 25 2008 05:53 AM

This movies seems like it will be great for giving epileptics seizures and little else. I think the reason a movies never been shot this way before is because it sounds incredibly stupid. I mean sure it's just like Speed Racer the cartoon, live action... for two hours, does that really sound appealing to anyone?

What really kills me is that I know the lady in the cube across from me at work is going to take her son to see this hyper-kinetic mess and then complain about his ADD and have the doctor jack up his meds yet again.

What's next live action two hour Dragon Ball Z?


(Reply to this)
walkingdead09
walkingdead09 writes:
on Mar 25 2008 06:00 AM

i like speed racer the cartoon, and they even have a speed racer comic book, so this thing will have a bigger fan base than you think. If they make it close to the cartoon who can complain. Now in my opinion there are so many other worth while movies that could be made, not sure why someone would pick this one over those, but then again I'm not a director or producer. No movie is good just because of the special effects though, so the actors and producer need to tell us it's a good movie not rave about special effects. If that were the case the day after tomorrow would be a good movie, and it's awful.

JD


(Reply to this)
Havokdx
Havokdx writes:
on Mar 25 2008 06:08 AM

Hey spike they already have a live action dragonball in the works, which they have reported here on RT.

(Reply to this)
LordVapor
LordVapor writes:
on Mar 25 2008 06:47 AM

I trust the brothers Wachowski on this one, and I will definately have to give this one a shot.




(Reply to this)
chewie louie
chewie louie writes:
on Mar 25 2008 06:50 AM

Come on guys, give this thing a chance. If you think about it . . . could the movie have been shot any other way? The way the Mach 5 jumps goes under water would have looked completely stupid if shot in the conventional manner. I'll reserve judgment until after seeing the movie. Right now, I am giving the Wachowski brothers credit for taking risks.

(Reply to this)
dreamworks21
dreamworks21 writes:
on Mar 25 2008 06:51 AM

yeah, im there too.

(Reply to this)
Crenshaw
Crenshaw writes:
on Mar 25 2008 06:56 AM

"Never seen before?" Wrong. I have seen this before. Go to the kids section of your local Video Hut and rent "Hot Wheels Highway 35 World Race" (http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0377191/). As I was watching the new Speed Racer trailer I could not believe how much of the race footage looks ripped off from that movie (granted, that film's Hot Wheels cars had capabilities obviously derived from the Mach 5). Still, the racing and CGI work is actually pretty darn impressive for a knock-off kid's movie. Worth a rental/queue.

(Reply to this)
MattBaerFTW
MattBaerFTW writes:
on Mar 25 2008 07:41 AM

im gonna see it it looks like they took the cartoon and put it into live action the end.

(Reply to this)
SpikesInMySkull
SpikesInMySkull writes:
on Mar 25 2008 07:45 AM

In reply to this comment (#1652166)
Yeah, I know... I was being ironic.

(Reply to this)
Kollikodon
Kollikodon writes:
on Mar 25 2008 07:51 AM

... Expect me in the line to see this... dont expect me to like it.

(Reply to this)
Rockslide
Rockslide writes:
on Mar 25 2008 08:30 AM

I'm of the camp that wants to see this. I'm all for trying new things and crazy directions in film. Who wants every movie to be exactly the same? I love it when directors take risks and try to bring something new to the table. This is definitely on my ever-growing list of summer movies. This will be a good summer for movies.

(Reply to this)
SpikesInMySkull
SpikesInMySkull writes:
on Mar 25 2008 08:31 AM

In reply to this comment (#1652255)
I'm sorry.

(Reply to this)
TombstoneLawDog
TombstoneLawDog writes:
on Mar 25 2008 09:02 AM

The Wachowski's had me at 'bullet time.'

The Matrix is the last movie I actually saw THREE times in the theater and it remains one of the coolest movies OF ALL TIME, despite the lackluster sequels.

This movie, though I can't give less of a metric batf#ck about the Speed Racer history and never watched the cartoon, looks like the W'Bro's brought their Matrix-style COJONES and dropped some beautiful STANK. I truly do trust these guys to blow my mind, visually, and I have every intention of seeing this in theaters.


(Reply to this)
stevegilpin
stevegilpin writes:
on Mar 25 2008 10:30 AM

The Wachowski Brothers are brilliant and this movie will most likely be good, even if it isn't amazing. Give them some credit. The Matrix, Bound, & V For Vendetta were all awesome.

(Reply to this)
High School With Money
High School With Money writes:
on Mar 25 2008 11:11 AM

Wow it seems like all that's being touted are the special effects and nothing about a story because if there was a story to be touted then said touting would ensue but since there's not I guess we're left with the greatest CGI reel of all time I can only hope that Speed doesn't turn out to be a mass murdering idjit like Neo because that would be wacky and then wackiness would ensue unless they all talk with run-on sentences kinda like this one OOOOOOOO-AAAHHHH-OHHHHHHH!

(this bit of - authentic - Speed Racer dialogue is courtesy of The Money)


(Reply to this)
kelvintheokie
kelvintheokie writes:
on Mar 25 2008 11:16 AM

In reply to this comment (#1652152)
Sadly, I think Fox 2000 bought the rights to DragonballZ from the Japanese parent company about 5-6 years ago. As such, your fears may come to reality...

(Reply to this)
kelvintheokie
kelvintheokie writes:
on Mar 25 2008 11:16 AM

In reply to this comment (#1652152)
Sadly, I think Fox 2000 bought the rights to DragonballZ from the Japanese parent company about 5-6 years ago. As such, your fears may come to reality...

(Reply to this)
zgberg
zgberg writes:
on Mar 25 2008 11:46 AM

High School with Money? Who's money, your parents?

(Reply to this)
LordAlexx996
LordAlexx996 writes:
on Mar 25 2008 11:49 AM

A lice action Mach 5 the greatest car ever made? I'm Soooooo going to see this one I just hope the cast can pull off their characters well enough, It's gonna friggin sweet to see live action Chim Chim.

(Reply to this)
arendr
arendr writes:
on Mar 25 2008 12:00 PM

"Things you've never seen before"

I already had a seizure when I sat through the Vantage Point trailer for 20th time.


(Reply to this)
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