Speed Racer (film)

Movie
German title	Speed racer
Original title	Speed racer
Country of production	United States ; Germany ; Australia
original language	English
Publishing year	2008
length	129 minutes
Age rating	FSK 12 ; JMK 10
Rod
Director	The Wachowskis
script	The Wachowskis
production	The Wachowskis, ; Joel Silver , ; Grant Hill
music	Michael Giacchino
camera	David Tattersall
cut	Roger Barton , ; Zach Staenberg
occupation
	Emile Hirsch : Speed Racer; Christina Ricci : Trixie; John Goodman : Pops Racer; Susan Sarandon : Mrs. Racer; Matthew Fox : Racer X; Roger Allam : Royalton; Benno Fürmann : Inspector Detector; Jung "Rain" Ji-Hoon : Taejo Togokhan; Richard Roundtree : Ben Burns; Nicholas Elia : Speed (young); Ariel Winter : Trixie (young); Paulie Litt : Spritle Racer; John Benfield : Cruncher Block; Scott Porter : Rex Racer; Kick Gurry : Sparky; Melissa Holroyd : teacher; Cosma Shiva Hagen : Gennie; Moritz Bleibtreu : Gray Ghost; Christian Oliver : Snake Oiler; Togo Igawa : Mr. Togokahn; Ralph Herforth : Cannonball Taylor; Valery Tscheplanowa : Russian Announcer; Art LaFleur : Fuji Announcer;
synchronization

Speed Racer is an action film from the year 2008 . Directed by the Wachowski siblings , who also wrote the script based on the Japanese anime series Speed Racer from the 1960s.

action

The young speed racer takes part in car races as a driver of the family's own independent racing team. Since he was little, everything has revolved around cars and speed for him. He emulates his brother, a legendary racing driver who was killed in a tragic accident. He leads a rather quiet life with his family and his girlfriend Trixie. One day Royalton, owner of the industrial giant and professional racing team of the same name, knocks on his door and makes Speed and his family a lucrative offer to hire him as a driver. However, Speed declines the offer for personal reasons, which Royalton takes him more than resentment. He explains to Speed that car racing is all about the power of money and that he will regret his decision. By manipulating a subsequent race in which Speed participates and indicting and discrediting the family racing team without any reason, he tries to put pressure on Speed.

Inspector Detector, an employee of the CIB, which investigates economic crimes and racing manipulation, approaches Speed, accompanied by the undercover racing driver Racer X, in order to win him over to the fight against the monopoly over Royalton and others, such as the villain Cruncher Block . Only recently, Racer X was able to free driver Taejo Togokhan from the clutches of Cruncher Block. In order to finally put an end to the machinations of the criminals, Speed takes part against his father's will together with Racer X and Taejo Togokhan in the notorious cross-country rally 'Casa Cristo', a race in which unscrupulous drivers get involved with illicit means in which his brother was tragically burned to death in the cockpit of his car years ago. On the first stage, Speed and Racer X harmonize so much in defending against an armada of bought opponents that Speed ponders what could be the reason for the good teamwork between the two. Racer X came onto the scene two years after the death of his brother and the buried body of his brother could not be clearly identified due to the complete burns.

Before the start of the second stage, Taejo Togokhan is given a drug while he is sleeping, which means that he can no longer drive and Trixi takes over the free wheel of the Togokhan team. In the end, the Togokhan team wins the rally, but it quickly becomes apparent that Taejo and his wealthy father were only interested in raising the share price of their father's company so that it could be sold to Royalton at a high price. The winner of this rally would be qualified to participate in the Grand Prix, which Royalton controls through secret victory language, but Taejo is not interested in participating. Racer X pays the angry and disappointed Speed a visit and encourages him. He also shows his face for the first time, which speed is alien and so he has to recognize that it is not his brother. Shortly thereafter, Taejo's sister, who wants to teach her brother and father a lesson, comes to the rescue and brings him Taejo's unused invitation for the Grand Prix, because according to the statutes, Speed is also entitled to start as a member of the winning team. To do this, he and his family set up the Mach 6 in a record-breaking 32 hours.

Speed is the last participant to register for the race. Given the correct invitation, Royalton cannot prevent this, but nevertheless offers a reward of 1 million dollars for the driver who catapults Speed out of the race. But all attempts by the opponents to force Speed off the slopes fail. In a furious race, Speed emerges as the radiant winner. In the cheering of the audience, Inspector Detector asks the proud Racer X whether it was right not to tell Speed the truth and in a flashback it becomes clear that the mysterious racing driver is Rex after all, who died in an accident faked and had his face changed with the help of an operation in order to be able to fight undetected on the side of the CIB. Rex aka Racer X replies that it may have been a mistake, but one to live with. Togokhan testifies in tampering trials, as a result of which Royalton is found guilty and has to go to jail.

backgrounds

Christina Ricci and Emile Hirsch at the 2008 premiere of Speed Racer at the Tribeca Film Festival

The film studio Warner Bros. announced in September 1992 for the first time that it owns the rights for a US American real-life movie by Speed Racer . However, two production attempts in 1994 and 2000 failed.

The film was shot from June to November 2007 in the Potsdam Film Studio Babelsberg and on several outdoor sets in Berlin . The production costs were estimated at 120 million US dollars, the German Film Fund (DFFF) contributed nine million euros. Warner Bros. worked with companies such as General Mills , McDonald’s and Puma AG for film marketing .

The world premiere took place on April 26, 2008 in Los Angeles. The film was shown at the Tribeca Film Festival on May 3, 2008, and was released in German cinemas on May 8, 2008. The film grossed around 43.9 million US dollars in US cinemas.

The German film and media rating in Wiesbaden gave the film the rating of particularly valuable.

synchronization

The German dubbing of the film took over the Film & TV sync after a dialogue book by Klaus Bickert and the dialogue director of Axel Malzacher .

role	actor	German speakers
Speed racer	Emile Hirsch	Ozan Unal
Trixie	Christina Ricci	Sonja Spuhl
Pops Racer	John Goodman	Hartmut Neugebauer
Mrs. Racer	Susan Sarandon	Kerstin Sanders-Dornseif
Racer X	Matthew Fox	Benjamin Völz
Royalton	Roger Allam	Hans-Werner Bussinger
Inspector detector	Benno Fürmann	Benno Fürmann
Taejo Togokhan	Rain	Stefan Günther
Ben Burns	Richard Roundtree	Engelbert von Nordhausen

Reviews

Only 39% of the 208 reviews listed by the Rotten Tomatoes review collection were positive.

Kirk Honeycutt wrote in The Hollywood Reporter on May 1, 2008 that the rudimentary emotionality was aggressive - the film with numerous special effects looked like a 3D video game. It is intended for anime and video game enthusiasts. Christina Ricci plays her least interesting role ever.

Todd McCarthy wrote in Variety magazine on May 5, 2008 that the film was particularly cartoonish and ignored all the laws of physics. It is like cotton candy - too sweet for young people to resist. The film could be financially successful, but the narrative structure was only thinly developed, the motivations remained unexplained. The cast is "very good" for a film of this kind.

Georg Seeßlen notes that in "the children's culture of the late 1960s, the" Speed Racer "series was one of the harbingers of new graphic narrative styles - long before the words" Manga "and" Anime "were a good style and the" Iconic Turn "was Model trains swept out of the children's rooms. "