Death Race shares only two things with the original Death Race 2000: character names, and automotive carnage. That was one more than I was actually expecting (I didn't realize that "Frankenstein" and "Machine Gun Joe" would be in it), so it was already one up within the first five minutes. Fortunately the other expectation was well met: the rolling destruction shown throughout the movie was phenomenal.
Not that it was a "good" movie: it wasn't. But it's not supposed to be. It's supposed to be awesome, entertaining, loud, and slick, but not necessarily "good." I mean, it's called Death Race. If you went to a movie with that title expecting to see a deep, moving period piece played out by the greatest actors of our time, then there's something wrong with you. You go see a movie called Death Race because you want to see a race that involves death. And it delivers: on-track action makes up the bulk of the movie, and every character that meets his end does so in a spectacular way, using tools of the trade such as napalm, road barriers, gunfire, and C4. My personal favorite was the Dreadnought, an armor-plated tanker truck sporting a cow catcher, machine guns, rockets, flame throwers, and wheel slashers. It was completely over the top, and was responsible for clearing more of the track in part of a lap than the rest of the cars managed in one and a half heats.
Which brings me to my next point: parents, this isn't a kids movie. Much like Wanted, this movie easily earned it's "R" rating with some pretty graphic on-screen deaths and plenty of harsh language. It's perfect for the overgrown kid in us that wants to see stuff look cool and go "boom," but leave the actual kids at home.
If you're looking for a good, mindless action flick that features cool characters doing cool things with cool cars, then you've got a winner here.
I said it before, and I still stick by it: The Chase is one of the best little-known movies in existence. I only wish there had been a great BMW model to go along with it. Alas, the closest I could find was an older Gama diecast - good for it's day, but not quite up to today's standards. If Tamiya ever decides to repop their 325i with a coupé body, I'll definitely revisit this movie car. In the meantime, I at least have a representative of this underrated classic on my shelf.
Not that I expect The Departed with every film outing, but this isn't even Leonard Part 6. Heck, I even enjoy quite a few "bad" movies: the inexperience (or simple ineptitude) of the director, writer, or actors can lead to some entertaining moments of unintentional humor or unexpected brilliance.
Neither of which happen in Speed Demon. It's not the worst movie I've seen by a long stretch, but it's unexpectedly boring for a film about street racers using otherworldly powers to gain an edge. The actors were wooden, the cars were slow, and the action was practically nonexistent. The only bright spots were the Chevelle, because it looked cool, and Candace Moon, because she sort of looked like Sarah Michelle Gellar who is cool. Sorry, David DeCoteau, that's all I can come up with.
So, if I didn't really like it, why did I build a model from it (especially when so many more deserving movie cars are out there)? Basically because I needed a testbed for a few ideas I had, plus I wanted to finally be able to add a Chevelle to my collection.
David Willis has posted some photos from Hasbro's Transformers SDCC panel. From the looks of things, both the Animated and Universe lines have some great figures on the horizon. Yu can check out his photos here.
In other TF news, IDW showed images of a S15-based Tuner called "Drift". As a sucker for realistic alt modes, I'm really hoping that this one makes it to toy form (even better if they can somehow add him to the Binaltech/Alternator series). You can see the images of Drift here.
The final production model of the 2010 Camaro has been officially unveiled, with assembly of the first cars scheduled to begin February 16, 2009. It looks good, essentially unchanged from what we saw of the concept car and Bumblebee:
You can watch a video of the unveiling on GM's site.
Terminator 2: Judgment Day hit number 1 in my "All Time Favorite Movies" list when I first saw it on the big screen 17 years ago, and it pretty much stayed there ever since. There are a lot of close contenders, but nostalgia always edges them out by a hair and T2 remains. I've finally gotten a chance to pay tribute to the film in 1/24 scale, with a model of Schwarzenegger's Harley-Davidson Fat Boy.
And if you haven't seen it yet, the teaser trailer for Terminator: Salvation is available here.
