It\u2019s been 21 years since the theatrical release of Super Mario Bros. kicked off what was supposed to be a wave of hit films based on video games. Since that time we\u2019ve seen only a few actual hits. The Resident Evil franchise is five films and counting and the first Tomb Raider and Mortal Kombat films were unqualified hits. Other than that and a few low-budget entries, it\u2019s been pretty much a wash for the genre as a whole. Yet Hollywood keeps trying to wring box office hits out of popular video games.<\/p>\n
This week\u2019s such entry is based on a popular street racing video game. Need For Speed is a racing game that, uh, well, ask Paul Tossi and Erik Kain why it\u2019s special and\/or stands out among the other racing games. As for the movie, Walt Disney DIS +0.18% is clearly hoping for a franchise of sorts, something to appeal to the demographics that made the first Fast & The Furious a hit as well as those who regularly play the game on which it\u2019s based. Breaking Bad\u2018s Aaron Paul is getting his crack at being a would-be leading man, with $66 million in production cost and however much more in marketing being spent towards these goals. The film\u2019s marketing campaign has been pretty pervasive, with a strong Super Bowl spot and trailers that highlight the film\u2019s practical car racing work.<\/p>\n
That the film is being converted to 3D at the last minute could be seen as a sign of desperation or merely a concession to the overseas marketplace (I saw the film in 2D). Expect an opening weekend of over\/under $20 million with the hopes that word-of-mouth over the film\u2019s stunt work and relatively kid-friendly tone (PG-13 rating aside, this is pure PG-material) will get the film to $60m in the states and that overseas can match or double that number. It\u2019s an unusual Disney-distributed release (produced by DreamWorks, natch) in that it wasn\u2019t insanely expensive nor either a Marvel film or an animated project, so it\u2019s the closest thing we\u2019re going to get to a Disney \u201cB-movie\u201d for a long time.<\/p>\n
poster-of-need-for-speed-movieThe Review:<\/p>\n
If Walt Disney\u2019s Need For Speed (produced by DreamWorks, distributed by Walt Disney) were 15% less overtly dumb and 15% less pandering to the stereotypical boy audience, it might have been a completely enjoyable B-movie romp. As it is, the picture succeeds purely on its technical merits, offering some frankly terrific car racing and car chasing footage inside a somewhat paint-by-numbers story line that insults our intelligence at every opportunity. If you can ignore or embrace how cartoonish and self-sabotaging the characters are and how moronic the screenplay is, there is fun to be had to this old-school 1970\u2032s-style throwback. In this era of willfully bad movies and intentional would-be camp \u201cclassics\u201d, there is something almost refreshing about the seemingly unintentional and thus completely sincerity awfulness of Need For Speed.<\/p>\n
The surprisingly complicated plot involves a blue-collar mechanic (Aaron Paul) who pisses away a $675,000 payday for himself and his colleagues on what amounts to a penis-measuring street race and then takes the fall when said street race ends in fiery tragedy. Two years later, he\u2019s out of prison exactly in time for a secret and potentially lucrative street race. For reasons not worth explaining here, our hero spends the second act of the film in a cross-country trip in a refurbished mustang and also alongside Imogen Poots, who has a stake in the car and thus demands to come along. Will Toby get to California in time to enter the race? Will he be able to at long-last prove that Dominick Cooper\u2019s Dino Brewster was actually responsible for the fatal drag race that kick started the plot? Will Michael Keaton stop talking down to the audience with spoon-fed exposition?<\/p>\n
In one\u2019s lifetime as a critic, among the sentences you\u2019re never expecting to write are \u201cMichael Keaton is terrible and should have been cut from the movie\u201d. It\u2019s not his fault really, as his street racing DJ is forced to deliver hilariously on the nose exposition and character explanation as well as generic clich\u00e9s. Pardon the obscure reference, but if you remember the hilariously ham-fisted expositional news cast that kicks off the action finale of Spider-Man 3, you\u2019ll have a good idea of how 90% of Keaton\u2019s dialogue plays out, especially in the third act. It\u2019s indicative of the film\u2019s unwillingness to trust its audience to connect the dots even when those dots are the size of an anvil. I could do with a little less lechery and pointlessly stupid humor (even if much of it is confined to a single stupid city-set sequence in the second act), but them\u2019s the brakes.<\/p>\n
Most of the supporting characters are pretty broad, while Poots almost makes her character more than just \u201cthe girl\u201d by sheer force of will even as the film keeps undermining her. Dakota Johnson has a nothing role and makes you see why she was likely thrilled to get a real role to play in Fifty Shades of Grey. But most people won\u2019t go to see Need For Speed for the character work and narrative. In terms of \u201ccars doing cool stuff\u201d, you will absolutely get your money\u2019s worth. The film is filled long and wide shots of real stunt drivers doing pretty impressive things behind the wheel of any number of very nice cars. The sheer quality (and occasional creativity) of the stunt work makes the film mostly worth seeing on its own for those so inclined. There are crashes here and there, but it\u2019s the near misses that most impress. The impressive mechanics are undercut by the film\u2019s somewhat bizarre moral compass.<\/p>\n
Poots\u2019s character thinks little of potential prison time and professional ruin by virtue of Paul\u2019s outlaw actions, and his friends are all too willing to risk the same to help him. And the film\u2019s racing scenes and chases only avoid copious collateral damage purely by default. It\u2019s not that our heroes go out of the way not to kill bystanders and cops so much as they luck out by not causing any explosive auto-related fatalities. Considering the film has the sensibility of a kids\u2019 picture, it\u2019s a little amusing how amoral the film is, as well as how wrongheaded it is in terms of personal responsibility and the finer points of the law. Even the early Fast & Furious films were somewhat upfront about their amorality, but Need For Speed has no such self-awareness. At no point does the film acknowledge Toby\u2019s responsibility both for the sins of his past and the present-day car-related carnage.<\/p>\n
Need For Speed is just good enough in terms of its action to make you wish they cared a little more about the non-technical aspects. It is bright and colorful, filled with impressively staged and coherently shot action sequences. The plot may not make much sense and the supporting characters may belong in a Disney Jr. cartoon (not a good one like Doc McStuffins), but it delivers what audiences arguably came to see. It\u2019s willfully stupid and outright immoral, but its sheer obliviousness amused rather than annoyed me. It\u2019s just a darn shame that no one involved trusted the same young audience that flocks to Pixar films to enjoy a perfectly successful racing film without a heavy dose of stupid to go with it. But in an era drenched in hipster irony and intentional meme-ready awfulness (see \u2013 Sharknado), the completely sincere Need For Speed may in fact be \u201cso bad it\u2019s good\u201d in the very best way.