SPEED RACER: Gotta Go Fast

March is Women's History Month, which Post-Credit Coda will take as an opportunity for weekly reviews of films by female directors. Of all the reviews I've written in 2+ years, only four and a half of the movies have been directed by women. Women are slooooowly starting to receive better on camera roles in Hollywood, yet the lack of female directors is a continuous blight on the industry. Unskilled and inexperienced men are typically given far grander opportunities while proven, talented women are ignored. Despite the adversity, some women still manage to bring their projects to fruition. Let's hope that in the future this becomes the norm rather than the exception.

Other Reviews in this Series.

Directors: Lana and Lilly Wachowski
Writers: Lilly and Lana Wachowski
Cast: Emile Hirsch, John Goodman, Susan Sarandon, Christina Ricci, Matthew Fox, Kick Gurry, Paulie Litt, Roger Allam, Rain
Runtime: 135 mins.
2008

The film opens with a flash of color, then the camera creeps in on the back of a racer. We hear the sounds of revving engines and squealing tires. We see the racer's foot tapping in anticipation. Then, a match cut to a child's pencil tapping on a standardized test. This is a flashback that shows us a glimpse of Speed Racer's troubled youth. The teachers consider him a problem child because all he wants to do, all he can really focus on, is racing. The boy sits at his desk, his concentration ebbing, until the drab classroom transforms into multicolored streaks of light, the essence of speed, and the little boy is driving just like his older brother Rex.

What follows is an extended sequence of adult Speed Racer racing, intercut with inserts of his family cheering him on from the crowd, each of which zips us away into another propulsive flashback that fills out Speed's relationship with all of the main characters and contextualizes the importance of the race. Typically "propulsive flashback" is something of an oxymoron, but not here. This isn't like Deadpool's clever but pedestrian use of backstory in the midst of action. This sequence is edited, paced, and scored such that even when we have entered quiet character moments, we feel as if we have never left the race.

All of this adds up to a stunning twenty minutes of discovery and emotion, culminating in Speed racing the ghost of his dead older brother for the course record. It is the absolute perfect way to begin this film, an opening that perhaps only compares to Up with regard to sheer bang for your buck, emotional investment refined into the most efficient and efficacious package.

I knew from one minute in that Speed Racer would be a masterpiece.

10 CLOVERFIELD LANE: A Goodman Is Hard to Find

Director: Dan Trachtenberg
Writers: Josh Campbell, Matthew Stuecken, Damien Chazelle
Cast: Mary Elizabeth Winstead, John Goodman, John Gallagher Jr.
Runtime: 103 mins.
2016

10 Cloverfield Lane is a great movie with a mediocre movie tacked onto the end of it. The script is tight and the performances are excellent. John Goodman in particular is incredible as the ambiguous savior/abductor about whom our thoughts and feelings are in perpetual flux. It's too bad the ending tries too hard to deliver some incongruous spectacle, and it's too bad this tight little thriller got branded with the Cloverfield moniker.

That's my review in brief. From hereon out, expect SPOILERS aplenty, because I'd rather not talk about this secretive little movie in the vaguest of terms.

MONSTERS UNIVERSITY: E Pluribus Anus

Twenty years ago Pixar Animation Studios revolutionized cinema with the first full length completely computer-generated film. Two decades later and Pixar is still one of the most consistently groundbreaking studios in the business. Leading up to the release of their new film The Good Dinosaur, I will be going through Pixar's entire filmography at the rate of two movies a week. We finish out our retrospective in disappointing fashion with the barren prequel Monsters University.

Other Reviews in this Series.

Director: Dan Scanlon
Writers: Dan Scanlon, Daniel Gerson, Robert L. Baird
Cast: Billy Crystal, John Goodman, Helen Mirren, Steve Buscemi, Peter Sohn, Joel Murray, Sean Hayes, Dave Foley, Charlie Day, John Ratzenberger
Runtime: 104 mins.
2013

In my Brave review, I mentioned that near the climax I wandered out of the room without even thinking about it. During Monsters University, on the other hand, I very consciously spent as much of the runtime as I could doing other things vaguely nearby the television. Of all the Pixar movies I've watched or rewatched for this retrospective, I was looking forward to Monsters University the least. I called Brave "wholly and unflinchingly average." MU takes it one step further and becomes crushingly average. This is a movie that has no reason to exist and never stops reminding you.

To be honest I'm tired of this series. I embarked upon it because I figured I would enjoy critically revisiting some of the great contemporary animated masterpieces, and I have, but the most recent arc of Pixar's filmography is incredibly deflating. Between the Cars movies, the botched diversity of Brave, and now the insipid pointlessness of MU, my personal stock in Pixar is at an all time low (which is still rather high compared to other studios).

MONSTERS, INC.: Scream of the Crop

Twenty years ago Pixar Animation Studios revolutionized cinema with the first full length completely computer-generated film. Two decades later and Pixar is still one of the most consistently groundbreaking studios in the business. Leading up to the release of their new film The Good Dinosaur, I will be going through Pixar's entire filmography at the rate of two movies a week. Now we're onto Monsters, Inc., which I enjoyed less and found more interesting than I remembered.

Other Reviews in this Series.

Directors: Pete Doctor, David Silverman (co-director), Lee Unkrich (co-director)
Writers: Andrew Stanton, Daniel Gerson, Pete Docter, Jill Culton, Jeff Pidgeon, Ralph Eggleston
Cast: John Goodman, Billy Crystal, Mary Gibbs, Steve Buscemi, James Coburn, Jennifer Tilly, Bob Peterson, John Ratzenberger
Runtime: 92 mins.
2001

Monsters, Inc. is Pixar's fourth feature film. Unsurprisingly, the germ of the idea for Monsters, Inc. derived from their other ingenious original property. Apparently after Toy Story was released, people told Pete Docter that they started really believing that their toys came to life when they left the room. Docter took that sentiment and applied it to his childhood certainty that monsters really did live in his closet. Many years and story iterations later, the Monsters, Inc. we know and love came to be.

In Monsters, Inc. Pixar returns to the buddy movie format of Toy Story. The protagonists of Monsters, Inc. are Sully (John Goodman) and Mike (Billy Crystal), an odd couple whose friendship makes complete sense. Sully's scary, Mike's funny. Sully's laid back, Mike's uptight. Sully's empathetic, Mike's neurotic. Sully's big and furry and blue, Mike's small and round and green. They're perfect complements, and their work partnership is record-breakingly fruitful--until a third party is introduced.

They work at a company called Monsters, Inc., which specializes in energy production. That energy is produced from the screams of children. Professional scarers travel through doors that, when activated, transport them to the closet of an unsuspecting child. They then do their best to scare that child and harvest its screams. They must be careful, though--children are incredibly toxic and dangerous.