Speed Racer

Speed Racer (Andy Wachowski/Larry Wachowski, 2008) "This will change everything," said an editor friend of mine. He was referring to the cutting style, I think—the fast blink-of-an-eye editing that has become the norm for action movies, to the point where it seems like a competition to see just how little footage can be used to create an impression that the eye-ball will retain so that an idea can be processed. The cutting style for Speed Racer stills allows a thought to sink in your head, even if that thought is: "That's a complicated move—not that it matters." Crowds stayed away in droves from "Speed Racer" and it's just as well. It's another of those all-flash-no-substance muddled-message Wachowski Brothers films. 

But it looks pretty—an all-CGI-spit-shined, "there's no there-there" green-screened hybrid of live-action and cartoon and a fair imitation of the limited animation style of the Japanese cartoon that inspired it, in all ways a cotton candy movie.

But it's also a kid's movie—race-winners get a bottle of milk to drink at the Winner's Circle—with curse words and crudities (Bad guy Snake-Oiler says at one point in a race "Let's pinch theses turds off!"), kids giving the finger, and an adult's curdled cynicism.

All the heroes are naively game, but the movie regards them as something to be pitied. It's a paean to the independent spirit that conspires in the shadows, and it teaches kids the Golden Rule: "Screw them before they screw you." 

Welcome to Dick Cheney's "Speed Racer."

But that's the way it is with the Wachowski Brothers. Fanboys like to see them as deep-thinkers, but you don't get far beyond the shallows before drowning in ambiguity. Folks crowed over the FX of The Matrix, and the veneer of the thing implied that it was a "Spartacus-frees-the-slaves" liberal message movie, but it was basically a fascist power fantasy where a superman saves the day as a Master of the Universe. And the crowd goes wide-eyed grateful for the benevolence of their new dictator. Leni Riefenstahl has brethren in the Wachowski Brothers.

But, it's just a movie, Ingrid; How is it? Technically brilliant in recreating a simplified reality with as much respect for photo-realism as anime, and no respect for the laws of physics, as demonstrated by a series of race-tracks that seem more like clamped-together Hot-Wheels patterns on which the cars cantilever and skid more often than they seem to be under any power other than centrifugal force. One begins to suspect that subliminal messages are flashed in front of our eyes in the form of "racing ads" and the whole film is dunked in Day-glo colors that haven't seen the silver screen since Warren Beatty's Dick Tracy. Too much use is made of travelling wipes in transitions—things float by taking the old scene with them (one of the devices is a race car driver on fire! Funny, huh, kids?).

The story is the basic "evil man" story of the cartoons transported to multi-corporation conglomerates trying to control everything, and an awful lot of time is spent showing just how eee-vil and corrupt (and surrounded by cool stuff) the bad guys are. The movie is over-crowded with incident and made busy with jokey things on the soundtrack with such regularity that one can start to predict when a "goose" will happen, such is the clockwork dependability of the movie.

Not that it matters, but how's the acting? Well, the best are old pros John Goodman and Susan Sarandon who know how to best exploit weak material. Christina Ricci puts in a spunky try, but Emile Hirsch, who is terrific playing real human beings is at a loss realistically playing a type with conviction. Matthew Fox plays "Racer X" anonymously, as if thinking it not worth fighting against the costume. And the kid playing Sprightle (Paulie Litt)is annoying as hell, but at least he's a professional kid, as all the others in the cast speak with mush-mouths. The monkey obeys orders well. Richard Roundtree makes a welcome appearance; he may be the coolest guy on Earth.

It's a movie that just ruins your day. The snarky cynicism and bad feelings can be summed up in this exchange that was probably going through the Wachowski's minds throughout making this car-crash of a movie—"The fans love it, don't they?" "They do, God help them."

"Go Speed Racer, Go!" ("...far away from us")

(Wilhelm Alert at 00:46:43)

Growing Up Addams

First, came the macabre series of Charles Addams\one-panel cartoons in The New Yorker (where the ghoulish family were only periodic characters).

Then came the TV series—the characters' names provided by Addams himself.

 

 

A quarter century later, given the trend to recycle old television into new movies, The Addams Family came to the big screen.

The Addams Family (Barry Sonnenfeld, 1991) The first directing job by cinematographer Barry Sonnenfeld, who came out of a short, boisterous career that started in the Coen Brothers/Sam Raimi early years of hyper-activity, something that he has maintained throughout his own films.

Sonnenfeld's movies careen between dead-pan humor and break-neck agitation—you could see it in some of his camera moves for the Coen's and you can certainly see it in the pell-mell caroming of the first big-screen version of The Addams Family. The casting is truly inspired and may, in fact, be perfect, with Anjelica Huston as Morticia, Raul Julia as Gomez, Chris Lloyd as Fester, and Carel Struyken as Lurch.*  

But the breakout performance is by 11 year old Christina Ricci as daughter Wednesday, who manages to make her lines all laughers with a bland expression and a direct unironic reading of her lines.  She found the secret to making the script work, because it isn't very good, (a collaboration between Beetlejuice author Larry Wilson and Edward Scissorhands scripter Caroline Thompson) not doing anything really unique with the characters, basically amping up the character traits of the TV versions while creating a plot in which Uncle Fester has been missing for 25 years (presumably lost in the Bermuda Triangle). Gomez's crooked accountant (played by Dan Hedaya) attempts to bring an impostor in to take over the Addams fortune.  For awhile, it looks like the plan succeeds, but it doesn't, and it's soon revealed that the impostor really IS Fester, and blah, blah, blah. 

One of the jokes that works—Pugsley's collection of "Stop" signs

Sonnenfeld ramps up the film for all it's worth, making a lot—in fact, too much—of the character of "Thing," the disembodied hand-servant to the Addams, but the only time the film gets lively is when children Pugsley and Wednesday are forced to participate in a school version of "Hamlet" which involves a sword-fight that they make look decidedly real. Sonnenfeld had the help of two legendary craftspeople Owen Roizman (who shot The French Connection and The Exorcist**) and master editor Dede Allen (who edited Bonnie and Clyde, Slaughterhouse-Five and Reds), but even played well, the material is stale, and was a major disappointment.  When it was announced that a sequel was being prepared, one could only think "...why?"

One of the Addams cartoons used in the film—this one
before the credits! \Frankly the film could have used
more of this and less of what they did use, which was
watered down sit-com material.

Addams Family Values (Barry Sonnenfeld, 1993) As much of a fan as I was of the "Addams" television show—I liked them, far more than the bland television families usually presented—I didn't even go see Addams Family Values in the theater (I was working—a lot).  

Big mistake. Sonnenfeld was back, having completed a slightly tamer Michael J. Fox comedy in the interim. Dede Allen was gone. Owen Roizman was replaced by Don Peterman (who'd DP'd Star Trek IV, Splash, and Flashdance) and Ken Adam, legendary Art Director, came on-board.

But the most important element was the script...written by Paul Rudnick*** with what must have been a poison pen from an inkwell filled with snark and maliciousness. It is an extraordinarily funny movie, despite an unpromising premise: the Addams welcome a new child to the family, a boy, Pubert (the original name Charles Addams gave to Pugsley, which was rejected by the network censors). 

This creates enormous tension in the family, as Pugsley and Wednesday exhibit jealously and make many plans to kill the child, who manages to thwart their every efforts. Concerned, Morticia and Gomez hire a series of nannies for the kids, all of whom are frightened away by the children, except for Debbie Jilinsky (Joan Cusack, never funnier), who attracts the attentions of Uncle Fester. When the children become suspicious of her behavior, she convinces Gomez and Morticia to send them to Camp Chippewa, run by the extraordinarily wasp-y and perky Gary and Becky Granger (Peter McNichol and Christine Baranski), who make no secret of their disgust with these "weird" children who don't fit in.

Indoctrination in Addams Family Values

Now, that is truly creepy.  And funny.  The "Camp Chippewa" segments are the best of the film's sub-plots, indicating that if someone wants to do another film with the Addamses they need to 1) get them out of the house and 2) hire Rudnick (This iteration's Gomez, Raul Julia, sadly, passed away a year after Addams Family Values was released). But, the entire film has more zest, more life (or what passes for it, given the subjects) and genuinely twisted humor than the original exhumation.****  

 

It's always a pleasure to run into on the tube, no matter at which point one comes in.  

* I love doing this if only to share finds: like Carel Struyken's 360 photography site, which you can find here.

** Roizman left the production after a month. Sonnenfeld, who started as a cinematographer with the Coen Brothers, ended up finishing the film himself.

*** Rudnick did some dialogue touch-up on the first film.

**** I've spared a lot of the quotable lines (they're peppered all over the Inter-spider-web anyway), but one little joke I love is the lighting of Morticia in Values-taking the "Kirk-lighting effect" used a little in the first film, and in the second, bending lightwaves backwards in order to achieve the same effect in every. single. shot.

Finally, this is my favorite Charles Addams cartoon....