Need for Speed Review
Was there a need for this movie?
I need to be careful when I speak of niche sub cultures if only because I am neck deep in one myself. If someone were to create a movie about the Warhammer world literally 99.97% of you would not only not know what the hell is going on or even care but I and my friends would be fascinated.
That being said my experience (from high school until late 20’s or so) with street racers is this: they buy a potential hotrod for about $10 grand, spend three years and $8 grand modding it up, and sell it for about $10 grand when they are a point away from losing their license for speeding tickets. None of them ever go anywhere (as far as I can tell neither Nascar nor F1 teams are recruiting guys who tear up 2 lane highways in a Honda Civic with a suspension upgrade and a B18 motor) besides back and forth down desolate highways.
(Also once I came across an accident scene where two guys were street racing on a foggy night and killed some poor guy on a bicycle. My sympathy for street racers is not terribly high.)
So I guess there is a chance that there is a huge sub genre of street racers for whom this movie would make sense. Unfortunately I like to believe there is a much bigger genre of people who enjoy scripts that are coherent. For those people this movie is pretty much a big waste of time.
I’m not going to say this movie was bad. Good and bad are relative things really. A salmon gets caught and eaten by a bear. Is that good or bad? Well, good for the bear but fairly bad for the salmon. If you approach this film expecting nothing but mindless driving action then in a sense it is very good. However if you hoped for stimulation of any part of your brain other than the stem then in another very valid sense this film is very bad. If this were the 50’s this movie would be the perfect drive in experience in that you could watch it as the mood suits you or spend the time trying to get busy with your date in the back seat. Ironically this film featured a big drive in scene. Where did they find a functioning drive in, exactly?
I will say I am a fan of real stunts and effects rather than CGI. It’s like they put some effort into it instead of trying to impress us with hi tech cartoons. The driving was impressive and required good choreography. If you are a fan of cool automobiles this movie will have you drooling as it is like the highlights of Top Gear done where they wreck half the cars. I appreciate a good ride (ask me about my 2005 Crown Vic. Believe it or not, there are people in this world who think that car is cool. I get about an offer a month to buy it) myself although am more inclined towards the American muscle cars featured at the beginning of the movie rather than the European racers towards the end.
The story, however, looks like they tried the old “Million monkeys on a million typewriters” approach but were about 999,997 monkeys short. The plot holes had plot holes. I don’t have all day to work on this review (driving to LA in my high performance Vic. I really shouldn’t watch race movies the night before a long drive) so will skip most of them, but how the hell can the main character avoid the combined police forces of like 22 states (who between them seem to have 2 helicopters and 5 cars) but some random Bubba rednecks can track him down on a road in the middle of no where? Also don’t you think the fastest Mustang ever built should be able to outrun a pickup truck and a couple of cement mixers? Also if you are in a high speed chase wherein several police officers are involved in crashes that might very well have killed them while on parole you are going to do a lot more than six months in jail
I think the best way to describe the story is it plays out like a video game. This is about right as the movie is based on a video game. It is true that some video games actually have amazing stories and complexities that would be the envy of most movies but EA is not know for being literary masters (or, for that matter, competent). It could be stated that in a B movie who’s main function is to provide another outlet for all the Fast and Furious fans a story is of tertiary concern and odds are the people making that statement are exactly the ones producing this film.
The story is of Tobey Marshall (Aaron Paul-Breaking Bad, the Last House on the Left, Mission Impossible III), street racer and car mechanic. He enters a local race with his crew Benny (Scott Mescudi-The Bling Ring, 30 Minutes or Less, Fright Night), a pilot who specializing in stealing assorted aircraft and teleporting across the country in defiance of all known laws of time and space; Finn (Rami Malek-Night at the Museum, Short Term 12, Battleship), a mechanic who seems to want to be naked; Joe Peck (Ramon Rodriguez-Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen, Battle Los Angeles, the Taking of Pelham 1-2-3), another mechanic who drives the worlds largest pickup truck; and Little Pete (Harrison Gilbertson-Beneath Hill 60, Accidents Happen, Conspiracy 365), another driver and the younger sister of Tobey’s ex-girlfriend Anita (Dakota Johnson-21 Jump Street, Beastly, the Five-Year Engagement). They jump in a series of really hot American muscle cars and wreak havoc through the streets of some small town, avoiding cops with the help of Benny and literally doing hundreds of thousands of dollars of damage to other cars and the city.
Tobey wins and afterward is approached by Dino Brewster (Dominic Cooper-Captain America: the First Avengers, Abraham Lincoln: Vampire Hunter, A Turtle’s Tale: Sammy’s Adventures (what’s the deal with this guy and movies with colons in them?)), a guy they all knew and hated in high school for some reason and who has grown up into a rich, arrogant jerk (while they all slave away as mechanics. I guess being a jerk has its benefits). Maybe they hate him because he is with Anita now? Seemed a little confused. Anyway, he comes to their shop the next day (Tobey owns it and his friends all seem to work there for free in exchange for use of an Xbox and giant TV). Apparently he has come into possession of the last Mustang Colby worked on and wants them to complete it. Turns out Tobey is near broke and needs the money desperately (remember that street racing equation I showed you at the beginning of this blog). They do it and sell the car to a rich dude and his super car chick Julia (Imogen Poots-That Awkward Moment, Fright Night, V for Vendetta) for $2.7 million (just to depress myself I calculated that that would buy 108 of my current car. Are there really people out there who wipe their ass with money like that? If you are such a person you are a pretentious ass hat).
After the sale they get into a fight and decide to settle it like all men do: in an illegal road race with millions of dollars worth of elite European racing cars. Pete joins in the race because…I don’t know? Dino had 3 cars? Tobey is about to win when Dino runs Pete off the road and he dies in a fiery crash. Naturally Tobey gets framed for it and spends 2 years in prison for manslaughter.
At this point we are reminded that this movie comes from a video game with the introduction of the Monarch (Michael Keaton-Really? I guess it has been a while since the original Batman and honestly all his best work since then seems to be cartoon voices so maybe he’s eager to get out there. Batman, Speechless, Jackie Brown. I’m particularily pleased to have found this Batman image in our Batman T-Shirt collection. It seems most apropos). The monarch is some rich guy who loves racing but spends all his time in his internet racing dungeon doing a radio show and puts together a race every year where people show up in millions of dollars worth of cars and then race for pinks. In a video game he would be the voice over cut scene you would see and listen to while the game’s next sequence is loading but in this film he fits in as organically and painlessly as a broken bottle in your next bowel movement. It really felt like the director ran into Michael at the local Starbucks and once they got him had to figure out a way to include him in the film at the last minute. Also Michael had a lot of other stuff to do and needed to film his entire performance in 12 hours so they set up a room in his house and bailed on all that pesky “interaction with other humans” business.
Tobey gets out and needs to get revenge on Dino by beating him in the big race that the Monarch is running. He calls the guy who bought the Cobra and offers to give him all the cars if he lets him use it in the race. The guy agrees but makes Julia tag along. At that point rent Cannonball Run and watch it on fast forward and you will get the middle 80 minutes of this film. In order to get invited into the big race he first has to attract the attention of the Monarch. To do that he goes on a driving rampage violating his parole and attracting the notice of every cop in the country. Fortunately for them there are only like 6 of them and they have never heard of a spike trap. However, while it might be easy to avoid capture by every cop in the USA it is nigh impossible to avoid being trapped by a half dozen rednecks in pickup trucks. Dino puts a bounty out on Tobey and the aforementioned trailer trash catch up to him on a road. Rather than accelerate to the Cobra’s reported max speed of 230 mph he opts instead to take them on a cross country road race with a bizarre helicopter rescue thanks to Benny in another stolen helicopter (don’t helicopters have keys or something?).
More driving madness ensues. The Cobra gets wrecked by yet more hillbilly mercenaries but Anita gives Tobey another car to drive in the big race. Racing starts, cars get smashed, about 20 police officers are either injured or killed, and Tobey is given a chance to prove what a good guy he is.
The stars.
In spite of my bitching about this movie I am a fan of Aaron Paul. In the few scenes where he was actually allowed to act he did a great job and reminded me why I loved him in Breaking Bad. One star. The cars were all pretty amazing. Even once they got out of the muscle cars that I love and onto the Euro stuff they were really fun to see. Two stars. Most of the driving action was really good and impressive. You have to give real camera work credit in these days of CGI mediocrity. Two stars. If you can shut off the part of your brain that craves a story more complex than “See Spot Run” this movie is pretty fun. Two stars. Total: seven stars.
The black holes.
The story was like if you tool all the worst plots from video games ever (including Pac Man) and used that to inspire your mediocrity. A crime against literature and really disappointed as the trailers really implied that there was more. One black hole. Every scene with the Monarch was teeth grindingly awful. To prep for this role must have listened to every radio personality ever starting with Hello, Vietnam and combined them into the worst amalgam shock jock ever. The use of his awfulness to punctuate the scenes was like throwing AA batteries on the floor of a roller rink. Whatever momentum the film had generated came to a screeching halt every time. Two black holes. Sorry Imogen Poots you are hot but your character sucked. Do you know a lot about cars or not? Can you drive more than 60 mph or not? What were you here to accomplish? One black hole. Most of the other characters sucked too but in particular I am going to ding this film for Benny, the pilot. Every time he showed up the believability of this film (all ready on the balls of its ass) nose dived. One black hole. This film seemed really eager to distract you from itself. It’s a race movie but let’s throw in a scene where one of the mechanics quits his office job naked. How about Benny in a stolen news copter using the camera to scope out girls jogging? One star. 
The incompetence of the police in this film and the complete disregard for the fact that your racing might have just killed dozens of people was annoying. At least Fast and Furious tries to keep from running civilians off the road. One black hole. The gullibility of Anita was really annoying, especially after Dino put out a bounty on Tobey. One black hole. Some of the action driving scenes were really dumb (especially the helicopter escape scene). One black hole. For that matter how exactly did the pick up truck guys catch them? Sorry but that part is still bugging me. One black hole. This film clocks in at a whopping 132 minutes and you will be feeling it’s length by the end. One black hole. Total: 11 black holes.
A grand total of 4 black holes. Should you see it? That’s an easy question to answer. If you like Fast and Furious then yes. You will get everything you ever wanted from a F&F film only with less chicks and slightly more naked man ass. If you don’t enjoy them then don’t bother. If you are a huge Breaking Bad fan and want to see Aaron Paul go for it but honestly he is not on the screen as much as you might like. Date movie? If your girl is into fast cars sure, but really not many more reasons. Bathroom break? I’d say the scene right after they drop Imogene Poots off at the hospital is pretty disposable. It’s just more story development and if you are in this theater for the story you probably don’t know how to use a toilet anyway.
Thanks for reading. My apologies for not getting this done on Friday but I had to drive to LA for a small Warhammer tournament (where I took best overall. Yah, me! I’m king of the world! (I mean nerds)). I’ll try to see something tonight and write it up tomorrow. Follow me on Twitter @NerdKungFu. Hit the Like Us on FB thingy up above and leave you comments on this movie or my review here. I do enjoy hearing from readers as long as you are not trying to sell fake Louis Vuitton bags. If you have an off topic question or suggestion (or even request) feel free to email me at [email protected]. Talk to you soon.
Dave
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