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sunshine revival challenge #5
(I'm doing #5 before #4 because yes)
these days have been so draining it's a wonder I'm still functioning. and actually doing things! or forcing myself to do things to distract my brain from thinking too much lol but it's working! I started reading the murderbot diaries, for example - great so far (I'm on book 2) and it's making me laugh that I relate so much to it. I, too, long for an opaque helmet to wear around other people. I totally get it. I've been writing too, my current wip has been a blast.
and miraculously, considering how inconsistent I've been with movies this year, I've been watching some stuff too. I rewatched speed racer (2008) for reasons recently and realized I love this movie even more than I thought! so!!! fair warning, this is an image-heavy post. lots of screenshots below the cut.
Challenge #5
Journaling prompt: Be a carnival barker for your favorite movie, book, or show (or any other of your choice - game, comic, anything else)! Write a post that showcases the best your chosen title has to offer and entices passersby to check it out.
prefacing this by saying speed racer was one of my favorite cartoons when I was a little kid. do I remember anything about it? no, because I have no memory of my first 7 years lol but trusted sources (my mom) tell me I watched a lot of speed racer before I was five, when we had cable. I grew up wanting to have a mach 5 one day, which is such a reasonable thing to want!!! who DOESN'T want a mach 5?
I'm not sure how or when, but I know I watched the movie once, then completely forgot about it, rewatched it again years later (I think when I was in college?) then forgot about it AGAIN, and rewatched it in 2023. that's when I knew I loved it! now I've rewatched it AGAIN to remember some plot points and I'm even more enamored than I was in 2023. it's all I want in a movie!! from cast to script to photography to directing, it's all perfect to me. (well. 95% perfect. the casting choices for the togokhan family were questionable at best lol the 2000s...)
it's such a faithful, direct adaption too. I like that about it! it honestly feels like the people behind it had a lot of love for the original material. (and for making movies in general.) it's down to the smallest the details, like using the sound effects from the cartoon. even THE POSE made it into the movie?!
I love this scene.
let's be real too: only people really committed to making such an adaptation could've gone through with the idea of keeping chim chim as a character. overall, keeping the names and the styling/motifs of the (human) characters was a smart move that in this case worked wonderfully. yes, his name is SPEED and his last name is RACER. why shouldn't it be, his dad (first name Pops) builds cars for a living! why shouldn't everything be super colorful and goofy-looking when this was originally a kids show!
racer x's mask, speed's helmet... goofy things no director would keep today but they DID!!!
as a rule, I'm particularly fond of colorful movies. miss me with the muted colors and gray tones of hollywood these days, THIS is what I wanna see. especially in this context! no need to desaturate a movie that was always supposed to be a blast of color anyway.
if anything, it feels like they turned the saturation UP lol the wachowski sisters did it for me, I'm so happy with every artistic decision they made here.
the shots?! can we talk about the shots? aside from the cartoonish style that I also love, I just think it's a beautiful movie. love the framing, the photography...
...the fun juxtapositions, the angles, the extra attention to light/reflection, the background behind the characters...
...THE TRANSITIONS!!! god, I love the transitions.
despite the furniture/colors being kinda 60s in spirit, the adapation moves the timeline away from the 60s but not to 2008 - it's to a futuristic setting that's sorta the jetsons-ish in style? and yes, it's a thing a lot of other movies were doing in the 2000s LOL but it works even better for speed racer because they went wacky on the race tracks (what even are those circuits), on the technology, on the physics. absolutely nothing in this movie is realistic aside from the plot about corporate greed and *that* is what makes it fun. all my love to unrealistic movies that say that yes, you can make your car twirl in the air and knock other cars around!!! DON'T LET YOUR ART BE RULED BY SUSPENSION OF DISBELIEF DENIERS!!!
you know what's something else I love and that gives me chills every single time? the jumping thing speed does with the mach 5/6. it never loses the appeal to me. it's the highlight of the racing scenes, and that's saying a lot because I love all the racing scenes. the casa cristo race is THE scene of all time. the grand prix race is THE way to build climax and conclude a character arc...
is this how fans of superhero movies feel when the titular character does their signature move
and this movie isn't just for fans of the speed racer cartoon, either. it's for need for speed fans, wacky races fans, f1 fans... people who like bumper cars and had hot wheels toys when they were kids LOL or just people who like color in their fun movies!!
worth mentioning as well:
susan sarandon and christina ricci 🙏 casting christina as trixie was such an inspired decision.
I think this is a direct reference to a scene or two from the cartoon:
bi rain only wears things that make him look hot, including a skirt. and he has these stupidly charming red highlights.
there is a ninja scene and it is played for laughs.
last but definitely not least, I like the story and how it's woven into the movie. speed's relationship with his older brother, the family drama, the way history repeats itself with rex and speed, the trope of the underdog winning against all odds, the discussion about how money corrupts sports (and everything else) and how things kinda fucking suck sometimes because money speaks louder and there's no escaping corporate greed.
those lines coming back during the grand prix race... GOD. the way this movie does flashbacks and shows us memories even during the races is so good. when speed cries looking to the side to the ghost image of his brother's car running right alongside him, then finishes exactly where rex's car did... that's cinema.
oh and I like that they used the announcers as a tool to tell the story too! it added so much, made things so much more dynamic. the announcers in different languages was a nice touch too, it makes it obvious how popular the sport is, how big of a deal it is, etc. plus it's a nod to how popular the cartoon was too - they have people who worked on the cartoon doing cameos as announcers! (and an actual real announcer and a real driver, apparently?) that's fun.
anyway, speed racer isn't my favorite movie of all time but it is one of them! I'm glad it exists.
these days have been so draining it's a wonder I'm still functioning. and actually doing things! or forcing myself to do things to distract my brain from thinking too much lol but it's working! I started reading the murderbot diaries, for example - great so far (I'm on book 2) and it's making me laugh that I relate so much to it. I, too, long for an opaque helmet to wear around other people. I totally get it. I've been writing too, my current wip has been a blast.
and miraculously, considering how inconsistent I've been with movies this year, I've been watching some stuff too. I rewatched speed racer (2008) for reasons recently and realized I love this movie even more than I thought! so!!! fair warning, this is an image-heavy post. lots of screenshots below the cut.
Challenge #5
Journaling prompt: Be a carnival barker for your favorite movie, book, or show (or any other of your choice - game, comic, anything else)! Write a post that showcases the best your chosen title has to offer and entices passersby to check it out.
prefacing this by saying speed racer was one of my favorite cartoons when I was a little kid. do I remember anything about it? no, because I have no memory of my first 7 years lol but trusted sources (my mom) tell me I watched a lot of speed racer before I was five, when we had cable. I grew up wanting to have a mach 5 one day, which is such a reasonable thing to want!!! who DOESN'T want a mach 5?
I'm not sure how or when, but I know I watched the movie once, then completely forgot about it, rewatched it again years later (I think when I was in college?) then forgot about it AGAIN, and rewatched it in 2023. that's when I knew I loved it! now I've rewatched it AGAIN to remember some plot points and I'm even more enamored than I was in 2023. it's all I want in a movie!! from cast to script to photography to directing, it's all perfect to me. (well. 95% perfect. the casting choices for the togokhan family were questionable at best lol the 2000s...)
it's such a faithful, direct adaption too. I like that about it! it honestly feels like the people behind it had a lot of love for the original material. (and for making movies in general.) it's down to the smallest the details, like using the sound effects from the cartoon. even THE POSE made it into the movie?!
I love this scene.
let's be real too: only people really committed to making such an adaptation could've gone through with the idea of keeping chim chim as a character. overall, keeping the names and the styling/motifs of the (human) characters was a smart move that in this case worked wonderfully. yes, his name is SPEED and his last name is RACER. why shouldn't it be, his dad (first name Pops) builds cars for a living! why shouldn't everything be super colorful and goofy-looking when this was originally a kids show!
racer x's mask, speed's helmet... goofy things no director would keep today but they DID!!!
as a rule, I'm particularly fond of colorful movies. miss me with the muted colors and gray tones of hollywood these days, THIS is what I wanna see. especially in this context! no need to desaturate a movie that was always supposed to be a blast of color anyway.
if anything, it feels like they turned the saturation UP lol the wachowski sisters did it for me, I'm so happy with every artistic decision they made here.
the shots?! can we talk about the shots? aside from the cartoonish style that I also love, I just think it's a beautiful movie. love the framing, the photography...
...the fun juxtapositions, the angles, the extra attention to light/reflection, the background behind the characters...
...THE TRANSITIONS!!! god, I love the transitions.
despite the furniture/colors being kinda 60s in spirit, the adapation moves the timeline away from the 60s but not to 2008 - it's to a futuristic setting that's sorta the jetsons-ish in style? and yes, it's a thing a lot of other movies were doing in the 2000s LOL but it works even better for speed racer because they went wacky on the race tracks (what even are those circuits), on the technology, on the physics. absolutely nothing in this movie is realistic aside from the plot about corporate greed and *that* is what makes it fun. all my love to unrealistic movies that say that yes, you can make your car twirl in the air and knock other cars around!!! DON'T LET YOUR ART BE RULED BY SUSPENSION OF DISBELIEF DENIERS!!!
you know what's something else I love and that gives me chills every single time? the jumping thing speed does with the mach 5/6. it never loses the appeal to me. it's the highlight of the racing scenes, and that's saying a lot because I love all the racing scenes. the casa cristo race is THE scene of all time. the grand prix race is THE way to build climax and conclude a character arc...
is this how fans of superhero movies feel when the titular character does their signature move
and this movie isn't just for fans of the speed racer cartoon, either. it's for need for speed fans, wacky races fans, f1 fans... people who like bumper cars and had hot wheels toys when they were kids LOL or just people who like color in their fun movies!!
worth mentioning as well:
susan sarandon and christina ricci 🙏 casting christina as trixie was such an inspired decision.
I think this is a direct reference to a scene or two from the cartoon:
bi rain only wears things that make him look hot, including a skirt. and he has these stupidly charming red highlights.
there is a ninja scene and it is played for laughs.
last but definitely not least, I like the story and how it's woven into the movie. speed's relationship with his older brother, the family drama, the way history repeats itself with rex and speed, the trope of the underdog winning against all odds, the discussion about how money corrupts sports (and everything else) and how things kinda fucking suck sometimes because money speaks louder and there's no escaping corporate greed.
those lines coming back during the grand prix race... GOD. the way this movie does flashbacks and shows us memories even during the races is so good. when speed cries looking to the side to the ghost image of his brother's car running right alongside him, then finishes exactly where rex's car did... that's cinema.
oh and I like that they used the announcers as a tool to tell the story too! it added so much, made things so much more dynamic. the announcers in different languages was a nice touch too, it makes it obvious how popular the sport is, how big of a deal it is, etc. plus it's a nod to how popular the cartoon was too - they have people who worked on the cartoon doing cameos as announcers! (and an actual real announcer and a real driver, apparently?) that's fun.
anyway, speed racer isn't my favorite movie of all time but it is one of them! I'm glad it exists.
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