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September 29, 2026

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Hope (2026)

This is a South Korean action, science fiction, horror film that is apparently the most expensive South Korean movie ever made. I can say that it is a pretty handsome movie, and makes the locale look more appealing than I had expected. It also has quite a bit of humor in it which makes it go down a lot more easily than otherwise might have at almost 3 hours in length. What the hell is a movie like this doing running for 3 hours? It makes no sense. 

Speaking of making no sense, the second half of the movie serves up a variety of moments that can be fun to watch but will be difficult to justify from a story point of view. But I will get to that in a moment. Let me start off by talking about the thing that works best concerning the movie, and that’s the first 45 minutes. As usual when there’s a monster, the frightening moments all take place before we actually see the monster. In this case, although they were heavy action moments as we were getting set up, the movie does shift from a horror film to a straight action movie. And that’s because the horror of the unknown is undone by the horror of the CGI that is used to create the antagonists.

My description of the plot is very brief. The police chief of a small South Korean fishing Village, is confronted by destruction that seems to suggest a massive monster is loose and at first he assumes it is a bear or a tiger. The size of the damage created in the wake of the monsters movement through the village tells us that this is no Earth-like mammal but rather something of enormous size and Power, and as we ultimately discover it originates someplace else in the universe. Yes it is an alien movie, I don’t think that’s the biggest spoiler. 

The thing that spoils the movie is not the reveal of the origin of the monster, but rather it is the abandoning of the mystery around the monster and what it looks like and what it is after. The story is a little confusing, because it turns out that there may be two different alien species that are involved. At least that’s the way it seemed to me when we get a more extensive look and a set of alien creatures that are not in the village but rather are in the nearby Woods. They look distinctly different from the creature that created all the havoc in the village and at the conclusion of the film there’s reason to believe that more than one set of visitors is present.

I think the movie is supposed to also play as a comedy, there are simply too many ridiculous things that happen in the story to take it seriously all of the time. One of the characters is tossed about, slapped and squashed in so many ways that it’s impossible to believe that he survived. Like the Energizer Bunny however, he keeps showing up and fighting on. Improbably he starts out as a somewhat unsavory character, but morphs through sheer survival into a heroic figure.

The Village police chief is a reluctant hero, and sometimes he is a little feckless, but that doesn’t mean that he is unsympathetic. I don’t have a huge amount of experience with Korean filmmaking , but I have noticed there’s a tendency to have some slapstick moments and annoyingly over the top characters appear in awkward situations. The chief runs into several locals, and some members of his own Department, that are laughably annoying. His character however is required to be annoying without the humor, and that makes the story frustrating at times because if anyone would  listen to somebody, maybe we would get to the point a little quicker.

There are two extremely long Chase scenes that take place in the film. In the First Act you have the excellent one, which follows the police officer in Pursuit of the monster as it smashes through the village with impunity, and kills dozens residents in the process. We see the Mayhem from his perspective as the monster stays just out of his view, around corners, below the horizon or on the other side of a wall. There’s some horrifying visual images which also provoke some laughter because they are so over the top. This is a pretty gruesome film. Once the target of the monster, the police chase reverses itself, and continues on for another long sequence.  These scenes are shot with great clarity and occasionally with lenses that make the edges of the film feel like they’re bending in scope, which influences  the way the audience is watching the action. In the last Act of the film there’s an equally long Chase and the police chief is again involved, but here it doesn’t feel original or is interesting because they repeat the same moment a dozen times. The monster chasing them gets close, they shoot something at it or it misses a turn and it falls back a little but then we repeat the process. It got a little redundant.

Consider this a spoiler warning, which I usually try to avoid but which I think is essential in talking about this movie and letting you decide whether or not you want to see it. In the last 15 minutes, the focus changes and the aliens begin to be our protagonists as opposed to our antagonists. It feels like a completely different movie has started, and there is not really a very clear transition to it. My guess is that this film is supposed to be the first in a series of movies portraying what is essentially an alien invasion. The trouble is we don’t quite know why they’re here, and we certainly don’t know why there are more than one of them, including crashing spaceships. It’s as if we’re repeating the mystery of the second set of aliens but they’re not recognizing and showing them. I don’t think you can do that trick twice and get away with it. 

I was not unhappy that I saw the movie, but I was surprised how long it ran. Both of the chase sequences I mentioned could have been cut in half in the film would be just fine. Just be glad that we’re not in charge of deciding whether to make the second film a sequel to this movie. I don’t have a strong desire to see what happens next, and if you’re going to end on a cliffhanger that really feels like something that you want to do, make us care. This movie seems to think that by putting words in the mouths of the aliens we will change our perspective and want to see it resolved. I think they’re wrong. 

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September 18, 2026

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Jerry Maguire (1996) Re-visit

How I almost completely forgot that I saw this movie at the State Theater this summer is beyond me. It was actually a very pleasant screening and my memories of the movie were validated by how much I enjoyed it and admired the writing. There are times when Tom Cruise comes in for heavy criticism, but this movie was an example of one of the few times that people seem pretty confident that he had done a good job and deserved some recognition for it.

The story of a sports agent who grows a conscience and tries to find a way to make his life work within the confines of those guidelines is a surprising one. Cutthroat operations around him and the competition he gets from his former colleagues it’s easy to despair and feel that people are only out for a buck and will stab each other in the back regardless of what they say. Of course it should have raised a red flag, when the number one draft pick prospect agrees to be represented by Jerry but his father refuses to offer a written statement of such an agreement. Fortunately it’s not our agent character who breaks his word, and it’s an example of one of the things that forces Jerry to confront his own unwillingness to commit fully.

Renee Zellweger practically steals the movie as the assistant who has a heart of gold and is willing to give it to Jerry both personally and professionally. The fact that Jerry is unable at first to recognize that he has in fact fallen in love is one of the most frustrating things in the story. The thing that makes it so satisfying at the end is that Jerry’s realization comes before he has made the crucial decision to end his marriage. He really did commit to the relationship because of his love of the little boy and the feeling that it gave him, but the more he struggled to succeed with his lone client, the more he begins to recognize how a commitment such as he is made professionally really is comparable to the one that he has in his personal life. When people give romantic comedies a bad name, I think all you have to do is throw this movie down on the table and challenge their presumptions. 

The reconciliation scene is often mocked because of the two great lines that make it work so well. * you complete me” is one of the best expressions of love that I’ve heard in a screenplay.. The only reason people can continue to joke about it, is because it is a true statement of love which stands up to any mocking they might try. The follow-up from Dorothy’s character is also parodied, ” you had me at hello”, is the release of a pressure valve in Dorothy and Jerry’s relationship that makes us feel great. It’s another one of those lines that Cameron Crowe deserved all the credit for and earned the award he did not get. (He had to wait until “Almost Famous”).

Cuba Gooding Jr. steals whatever movie Renee Zellweger didn’t get, with his egotistical self-centered receiver, who also learns that commitment goes two ways. He always had it at the personal level, but not so much at the professional level. After all, the key line that everybody remembers from the movie, is” show me the money”, and it takes a moment on the field connecting with the crowd to make him realize that he needs a commitment to the audience as well as his family. This movie may seem light on the outside but then on the inside it’s pretty deep. I’m not sure you can ever go wrong recommending “Jerry Maguire” to anybody..

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September 10, 2026

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Coyote vs. Acme (2026)

As usual, I’m late to this because I’ve been so busy. I have however done a podcast on it so I will include that at the end so that my comments here don’t feel too brief.

“Coyote vs. Acme” is a completely delightful mixture of live action and animation, it’s not as elaborate as “Who Framed Roger Rabbit “and I frankly can’t compare it to the Looney Tunes Space Jam movies because I’ve never seen them. Not being a basketball fan I didn’t care much about Michael Jordan against Daffy and Bugs. I am however interested in a good argument and the idea of litigation by Wile E. Coyote against the Acme company was very intriguing.

We talked a bit on the show about why this film almost got canned for tax purposes, the people in charge of Warner Brothers don’t seem to know what the hell they’re doing. Maybe that’s why they are ripe for acquisition by Paramount. Anyway this film was extremely well made and I frankly tell you, it was funny. I mean I really laughed quite a bit during the movie. Being an old school Looney Tunes guy, it fit my expectations perfectly.

There’s a nice twist about halfway through the story, which helps maintain the consistency of our Title Character, and I appreciated that. I also appreciated the way they used all the other Looney Tunes characters by not treating them as if they are movie stars but rather they are just characters in the story. Even Bugs and Daffy, who do appear in the movie, are just secondary characters and not celebrities at all. For the most part the film avoids being too politically correct, all though Speedy Gonzales never gets an on-screen credit and Pepe Le Pew does get labeled as if he was being judged by 2020 standards . It doesn’t matter because there was a good joke there.

Being a bit behind gives this film an opportunity for me to look at its box office returns. I think it is doing extremely well given the expectations and it demonstrates why sometimes the bean counters in the tax department should not be making the decisions about what films ultimately get distribution. I suspect the Batgirl film would have done perfectly fine, so it’s disappointing that it didn’t get a chance to escape the way this movie did.

If you want to know more of my thoughts and what I appreciated in the film, take a listen to or watch the podcast. By the way, I was not alone in my appreciation. We had pretty much a unanimous opinion that this movie rocks.

https://www.podomatic.com/podcasts/lambcast/episodes/2026-08-31T15_16_15-07_00

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September 10, 2026

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The End of Oak Street (2026)

It’s great when we get to the end of summer and there are still movies coming out that treat the summer as if it is an endless opportunity for fun. “The End of Oak Street” is one of those movies that makes August bearable in spite of the heat ( which by the way in Texas has been 103°) , and the pending gloom of fall, and for those who care, a return to school.

I am a big fan of a previous film from David Robert Mitchell ( although I’m not sure you should trust somebody who has three first names), “It Follows “.  That film would truly classify as a horror movie, I’m not so sure however if “The End of Oak Street” fits that category. In many ways it is a horror film because it is a Creature Feature and humans are being hunted by monsters in the story. However because the monsters in this story are dinosaurs, I may be inclined to call this an adventure story rather than a horror movie. This is a distinction I plan on talking about with my friends on the LAMBcast later this week.

There have probably been other people who have said it, but from my perspective this is the best sequel in the Jurassic Park series, since Jurassic World.  Technically of course it’s not a Jurassic Park story at all, but its roots are clearly grounded in the same kind of Summer adventure and thrills that those movies have mined successfully for the last 30 years. This one sort of reverses the scenario, and instead of visiting a park with Dinosaurs, the Dinosaurs show up in your backyard.

Eventually we do get a discussion of how this whole thing happened, but that’s the least interesting part of the film. What works best is the family dynamic, of two parents and two teen children struggling to survive in a clearly hostile environment, one in which many of their neighbors do not survive. The dinosaurs in this movie represent a wide variety of species, and many of them seem to have very aggressive tendencies, which I suppose is exactly what you want if you’re creating a summer thriller.

Ewan McGregor and Anne Hathaway star as the parents, who are of course struggling with adult issues in the 1980s setting in which the film takes place. Hathaway is fully invested in the film and she is the focal point for the dramatic arc of the story. There are all sorts of moments that add a bit of humor to dire circumstances, but expect some gruesome deaths and PG-13 violence.  Some people will have an issue with the resolution, but don’t think too hard about it all. Just sit back and enjoy a fun family thriller with enough bite to keep it real. 

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August 25, 2026

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Ice Cream Man (2026)

 I’d say this movie was a disappointment but I didn’t really have high expectations for it in the first place so it’s hard to reach that conclusion. Basically this is a rip off of the concept from “Weapons” ,  and not a very good one at that. The idea of creepy kids being used to take retribution is a cross between a “Nightmare on Elm Street” and the film from last year where Amy Madigan played the part of an ice cream man, sorry I mean witch.

This film is told from the perspective of the young protagonist, a lactose intolerant lad who has been bullied by classmates and even a little bit by his friends,  but in the end, he stands up the firmest against the evil that is encroaching on his small town. The story doesn’t make much sense until we get a data dump in exposition from a local priest about 2/3 of the way through the movie. And if by any chance you’re suspicious of the priest and what he has to say, you will not be at all surprised at the twist that comes near the end.

This is an Eli Roth film, so no one’s expecting much subtlety. When the vicious killings occur, there’s not really a lot of cutting away, we’re going to see heads separated from bodies, faces smashed to smithereens, and dismemberment galore . Once in a while we get a sly joke inserted into the mayhem, unfortunately they don’t always land. I can say however, that there was one bit that landed for me. There is a very funny scene which is basically a takeoff on the playground scene from Alfred Hitchcock’s the birds. It builds in a form that mimics Hitchcock’s style of shooting in that scene, and the juxtaposition of antagonists is what makes it work.

The Ice Cream man depicted in the film never really talks. And in spite of the horrible things that occur, there is even a slight effort to make his character somewhat sympathetic. That doesn’t work, for the obvious reasons that innocent people are harmed in the process and that in the absence of any words of contrition from the victims, the Ice Cream man just continues to smile maliciously.

So the movie plays like the gore version of The Pied Piper of Hamlin, with indiscriminate victims, and innocent children turned into murderers. Ho hum. I guess I should have known when I saw that Osgood Perkins was a producer on the film. Let’s just say he’s gone zero for three with me, and I’m someone who appreciated that Eli Roth was directing this film,

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August 25, 2026

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Thief (1981) Re-visit Paramount Summer Classic Film Series

It felt a little like I was going to a James Caan Film Festival this last weekend, since he appeared in both the Saturday night and Sunday night films. His part in “Bottle Rocket” was barely more than a cameo, but he is clearly the star of Michael Mann’s “Thief”, the Sunday night experience and one of the best performances of Caan’s career. I saw this film when it was originally in theaters back in 1981. I think I may have seen it one more time on cable sometime in the late 80s. 

For a film that I hadn’t seen in more than 30 years and saw only a couple of times before that I remembered quite a bit. I also misremembered a few things, it seemed to me that Willie Nelson had a bigger part in the movie, but that was not true. He had two very brief scenes. Nevertheless the crime component is the main element of the movie and that I did remember. 

Caan plays a master Thief who’s used to operating on his own, but in a bid to rush his exit from the criminal world, he agrees to pull a job for a syndicate, and of course that leads to trouble. The movie is drenched in atmosphere, lit with the blues and blacks that characterize a lot of Michael Mann films. Once in a while there are splashes of color like the neon that would become emblematic of Miami Vice, but it was all a lot more subdued in this particular film. A layer of dread also hangs over the enterprise, created by the haunting music score from Tangerine Dream. It suggests constant suspense and danger, even when people are just sitting in a diner arguing over coffee. 

The central premise is that our Master Thief, Frank, is so autonomous that no one can control him. I find it frankly easy to believe that he might be the same character played by Robert De Niro in Michael Mann’s Heat 15 years later. Frank stands up to a brutal beating by corrupt cops who want a slice of the action, and he cleverly beats them at their own game so that he can carry out the main crime. As in most heist films, for some reason the audience usually identifies with the criminal, we want them to succeed and not be caught. It’s great when a plan plays out the way it’s supposed to, and no one gets hurt.

Of course if no one got hurt in the plan, and it was perfect, there wouldn’t be any drama in the story. That’s where the boss of the crime syndicate comes into play. Robert Protsky, plays a avuncular, seemingly reasonable gangster, who makes big promises, and comes through on some of them, but breaks the one rule that Frank sees as a red line. 

The conclusion of the film is really a test of Frank’s Independence. His willingness to fight back against the intrusion on his autonomy, is the main focus of the third act. Once again we may want Frank to succeed, but we’re not going to see him as a very good person, because of the sacrifices he’s willing to make in order to stay his own self. I don’t think however it could have gone any other way and felt authentic.

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August 25, 2026

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Bottle Rocket (1996) Re-Visit Paramount Summer Classic Film Series

Over the years I’ve become a fan of Wes Anderson films, “Bottle Rocket” was his first film, but it was not the first one that I saw. I’m pretty sure that “Rushmore” was my Gateway into Wiss Anderson filmography. It was after that film that I went and rented “Bottle Rocket” and watched it at home. I had virtually no memory of seeing it other than the memory of going to Blockbuster, putting it in the VCR,  and being done with it later and thinking that was a nice bit of nothing.

30 years later I’m pretty much in the same place. “Bottle Rocket” is a shaggy dog story, with the two brothers Owen and Luke Wilson playing off of one another as dimbulb characters whose lofty goal is to become master thieves. Or maybe that’s just the goal of Dignan, the delusional character played by Owen Wilson in full stoner mode. For some reason he’s the character who hasn’t been in a mental institution but clearly should have been. Anthony is the friend who has been self-committed for a time, played by Luke Wilson, as a character who’s only guile is fooling his friend and indulging his delusions. Otherwise he’s a pretty stand-up fellow.

The ridiculous 75-year plan to become Master criminals and live a life of ease is Dignan’s fantasy. It is however clear from the very beginning that these two guys, along with their friend Bob, are too inept to be successful as criminals. At best they would be small timers forever at worst they might get killed pulling off a job that would hardly be worth it. What pleasure is found in the movie is in seeing Anthony trying to make a connection with the maid at the hotel that they’re staying at, in spite of his inability to speak a language she understands. 

The sincerity of this Romance is put as a backdrop to Dignan’s plan to connect with Mr Henry, his former boss at Landscaping Company, who also happens to be a low-level criminal. If crime were all in the planning, then Dignan and Anthony would be at the top of the game. For them the problem is that crime is really in the execution, and they are frankly not capable of executing anything more complicated than opening a can of beer.

The story here is not deep, we kind of want the best for these idiots, but we also recognize that they deserve to go to jail for the activities that they are engaged in. At the same time we want Anthony and Inez to work it out. I did think there was one clever twist along the way concerning their plot, but it’s not one that benefits them at all. Mr Henry is the one who’s capable of planning and executing a crime, not these three dimwits. 

The offbeat humor and the thickness of the main characters are the traits that mark this as a Wes Anderson film. He will continue to mine these tropes for all of his future movies, but he will add a plot and additional characters to make those a little bit more absorbing. Meanwhile “Bottle Rocket” is a pleasant enough couple of hours, that you won’t mind having spent some time watching. You may however have trouble remembering why I was so pleasant.

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August 25, 2026

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Reservoir Dogs (1992) Re-Visit Paramount Summer Classic Film Series

My daughter and I are already in the middle of a rewatch of Quentin Tarantino’s filmography. The fact that “Reservoir Dogs” was playing at the summer classic film series is just pure coincidence, but a happy one, because I haven’t been able to see this film on the big screen since the first time I saw it at the Colorado theater in Pasadena in 1992.

This story is going to repeat itself on my page chronicling some movie visits with my late wife. I’ve been trying to do that sequentially, so this is a little out of order. This was Tarantino’s first film, and I had read about it in one of the national magazines and the splash that it was making at Sundance. I was anxious to see it and I brought my wife with me, and neither of us had any idea of what we were getting into. The film is pretty brutal, and the language is coarse, but for the most part that did not seem to be bothering her. Until the scene where Michael Madsen, while dancing to Steelers Wheels , cuts the ear off of a cop that he is torturing. It’s at that point that my wife leaned over to me and said in my ear “you owe me big time”.  She was apparently a little miffed that I had exposed her to something so savage.

Anyway the rest of the movie is almost as savage, the fact that Tim Roth spends the majority of his performance laying on his back screaming and moaning from a gunshot wound is only part of it. The characters, famously named after colors, which was inspired by “The Taking of Pelham One Two Three”, are all reprobates, that may have a gift for gab, but with whom you wouldn’t really want to be involved in a conversation. 

Speaking of conversations, it’s hard for me to believe that I actually showed the opening diner scene with  criminals sitting around the breakfast table arguing about tipping, in my argumentation classes. The vocabulary they use and the graphic way in which they describe their opinions, was not my focus, but rather the way they tried to parry one another’s points, and refute the claims being presented, while talking about an opinion that they differed on. I’m pretty sure that if I was showing this in my classes today, I wouldn’t be retired, I’d be unemployed.

Although there are a few scenes set outdoors, and a few other locations, this movie is the perfect scenario for a first-time screenwriter /director who has a limited budget. It’s almost like a piece set in a single scene, because so much of what is going on occurs in the warehouse, and everything else is just a flashback. This was our first opportunity to fully absorb the way Tarantino’s characters spoke. For the most part they are articulate, forceful, and vulgar. Actors exchanging his dialogue is nearly hypnotic, and this will be a trademark of all of Tarantino’s subsequent movies.

The pop soundtrack is another giveaway of future Tarantino trademarks. Heavy on ’70s film references, and the soul and pop songs of the era, it makes the squeamish elements more tolerable for those of us who know the tunes. The theater was packed, and everybody seemed to appreciate it when Mr Pink rubs his thumb and index finger together, playing the world’s smallest violin for all the waitresses in the world.

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August 25, 2026

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Fargo (1996) Re-Visit Paramount Suimmer Classic Film Series

Like a lot of film fans, if you ask me on any given day what my favorite movie is from a given director or actor, my opinion is likely to be influenced by the most recent film I’ve seen of theirs. For me I don’t think that’s the case with the Coen brothers. I really enjoy and love most of their films, but “Fargo” has always been my favorite. It features one of the greatest characters that they ever created in Marge Gunderson, the police chief of Brainerd, MN,  who heroically pursues malfeasance in her community. Frances McDormand has been a fixture in the Academy Awards process ever since Mississippi Burning, but this is the film that cemented her as the leading actress of our era.

“Fargo” starts off with a lie, one that most people don’t even realize has been passed off on them. An opening card says that the movie is based on true events. No it is not. The mischief that is created by this line is continued in the ongoing Fargo TV series which uses the same conceit, and tagline about how only the names have been changed in respect to the dead and to protect the living. Joel and Ethan Cohen created a mythos with that line which works to make the film that follows more epic than it really is

Francis McDormand is not the only outstanding performance in the film. There are two other actors whose contributions to Fargo make it one of the great dark comedies of all time, while simultaneously being a grim crime story. William H Macy plays Jerry Lundergaard, the hapless car salesman who has taken out a loan against the inventory on his Father-In-Laws car lot, in order to invest in a piece of property he thinks is going to turn a tidy profit down the road. Of course the problem is he needs more money than he can get, and his solution is to kidnap his own wife and to ransom her using his father-in-law’s money.  Macy presents a guileless persona in  Jerry, he’s a character so conniving and reprehensible, while at the same time being a simpleton and a pushover. You get a good example of his feckless success in the scene where he passively aggressively bullies a customer into paying for an undercoat for the new car he is buying. We get a chance to see how capable Jerry is of lying while still trying to look like a powerless fool. The fact that he is a powerless fool doesn’t hurt.

The third Ace in this hand is Steve Buscemi’s Carl Shoalwalter, a professional criminal nearly as feckless as Jerry is. His frustration with his lot in life builds up to a crescendo of violence rather than a shrug of powerlessness. Buscemi is smarmy and  belligerent, dangerously so when he confronts his own partner. No one in the story is reliable, but we can count on Buscemi to always make the worst choice possible and act as if he is the victim instead of the victimizer. Along with Mr Pink, his character and “Reservoir Dogs”, ShowWalter, establishes Buscemi as the weaseliest character actor of the 90s.

Just like Tarantino does, the Coen’s turned violence into grim humor, but unlike Tarantino, whose joke usually depends on the visual explosion of a handgun in someone’s face, the Coen’s make the situation the source of the humor. The violence is just the consequence of a particular situation. We don’t need to see Buscemi shoot the face off of an innocent ticket clerk in a parking structure, his frustration has already been set up, all we need is to see the consequence.

Chief Gunderson, has a couple of great scenes where her real sincerity is contrasted with the deceptiveness of the people she’s interacting with. Her kindness in regard to a former classmate, who clearly has emotional problems, and seems incapable of telling the truth, makes us see Marge as the decent woman she is in a tough job. In the two times she confronts the duplicitous Jerry Lundergaard, she is authoritative and polite up to the point, where Lundergaard’s rudeness demands that she step up. Her voiceless confrontation with Peter Stormare’s character, as he is disposing of his partner in the wood chipper, shows that she is also fearless, under that veneer of Minnesota nice. 

Even though the film plays out as a tragedy, with several senseless deaths, which occur under uncomfortably amusing circumstances, there’s still some hope. As Marge and her adoring husband lay in bed contemplating the future and their soon to be born child, we get a sense that the normal people in the world still have a chance. That’s about as hopeful as it gets.

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August 18, 2026

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Speed racer (2008) Revisit

27 years ago a cult grew up around the films of the Wachowski Brothers / sisters, with the release of”The Matrix”. It was a groundbreaking film that utilized special effects, clever camera tools and frankly brilliant framing and staging, to make a science fiction film a classic. The two sequels never lived up to the promise of that first film, because they got bogged down in a series of philosophical and existential musings.

How could they redeem the promise that they showed with that first Matrix film? For my money the answer is apparently the gloriously overstuffed “Speed Racer”. When this film came out it didn’t do any business that is worth writing home about, which always amazed me because it looks spectacular. It may be that I am just one of those people who’s willing to go along with the conceit of a filmmaker if it strikes me as being appropriate in the moment. For example, I love films like “Snakes on a Plane”, “The Adventures of Buckaroo Banzai across the 8th dimension”, and “Swiss Army Man”. “Big Trouble in Little China” may be the most enjoyable film that John Carpenter ever made but I know there are people who just can’t get into it, well I can. And “Speed Racer” is a movie that I’m willing to do the same for.

This movie looks like a cartoon, moves like a cartoon, and is acted like a cartoon, and that’s one of the things that makes it so much fun. When Warren Beatty made “Dick Tracy” back in 1990, he used a very specific color palette and lighting strategy to evoke the comics of the era that the character came from. The Wachowskis are doing the same thing with this movie. The colors are dazzling, oversaturated Neon hued, and they whack you over the head.

If you’ve never seen the movie it’s hard to describe what the experience is like. It’s very immersive, and very loud, and I’m surprised that anybody who suffers from motion sickness can get through a screening of this film without passing out or vomiting. I guess I’m lucky because mostly what I get is an Adrenaline Rush and the kind of brain stimulation that occurs when I drive down the strip in Las Vegas. This particular screening was even more so, because it featured a new 4D presentation of the film on the largest IMAX screen in the state of Texas. It was an assault on your senses that you voluntarily take on, in the hopes that it will get you a kind of psychedelic High without actually having to drop acid.

In the nearly 20 years since the film came out, it has acquired a cult status, which overcomes its initial failings. When I see people criticize the film because they object to the little brother and the chimpanzee, I know they have completely missed the vibe that I experience when I see the movie. Sure the kid is corny, and some of the jokes are obvious, but if you take a look around you’ll see that that’s true everywhere in the movie. That’s one of the pleasures of this film, it is exactly what it wants to be. This movie wants you to give in to the sensory stimulation and the artificial nature of the visuals. If you can accept the little boy and his chimpanzee smuggling themselves in the back of a race car, or engaging in hijinks on a private plane, or simply just being a nuisance, then it’s easy for you to accept the ridiculous car chases, race sequences, and comic book villains.

As a kid I never really watched Speed Racer, so I don’t have that nostalgia to fall back on as a reason for my love of this movie. My embrace of it is clearly based on the audacity of the concept and its execution. I have not been enthusiastic about other films from this duo, but along with “The Matrix”, “Speed Racer” has my respect for them as filmmakers.