Speed Racer - 4K Blu-ray Review

[Michael Scott]

Speed Racer



Movie:
4K Video:
Video:
Audio:
Extras:
Final Score:


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Movie
Sometimes I honestly feel like I’m one of only a dozen people who absolutely adored 2008’s Speed Racer. I remember going to the theaters all excited over the Wachowski’s adapting one of the most iconic sports Anime of all time, and then finding out that it bombed so hard at the box office that even the middle east said “see!!! that’s what it feels like!”. The Wachowskis had just come off of The Matrix trilogy and Warner basically handed them a blank check to do with as they pleased. They could do no wrong and the idea of adapting an anime into real life wasn’t that big of a concept back then. So with a $120 million budget, they set out to make a weird hybrid of live action anime, bits of the Looney Toons, and some of the strange aesthetics of The Fall into what would become one of the most gonzo major studio films of the last 20 years. Audiences had no idea how to view the film, as it didn’t adhere to any standards of the time, and the general populace rejected it in droves. The film barely managed to make $94 million worldwide on that $120 million budget, effectively becoming one of the biggest bombs of 2008 (beating out The Love Guru thanks to Warner Bro’s losing almost $88 million on it).

BUUUUUUUUT, I still loved the movie to death. I really feel that a lot of the film’s early hate was due to misunderstanding what the Waschowskis were trying to accomplish, as well as the shock of watching what was essentially a live action cartoon with so much CGI you could almost say that it WAS a cartoon. They wanted something big, bold, and serious like The Matrix. But what they got was a family friendly adventure story that is so self aware that it does everything but break the 4th wall, ala Deadpool. Maybe if expectations had been reigned in it would have had a better reception? But who knows. All I know is that this is still a film that puts a huge smile on my face every time I watch it.

Speed Racer (Emile Hirsch) knows only one thing. Driving. He’s a race car driver in a family of race car drivers after the death of his older brother Rex. Stuck with a legacy of his brother dying in one of the most vicious cross country races of the future, but an over protective father (John Goodman) and mother (Susan Sarandon) who want to keep him from suffering the same fate as Rex did. But Speed Racer’s life changes forever when he finds out that the Grand Prix has been fixed for the last 50 years or so, and his entire world comes crumbling down. Teaming up with CIB Inspector Detector (Benno Furmann) and the mysterious secret agent Racer X (Matthew Goode) to take down the head of one of the biggest sponsors (played by Roger Allam, hamming it up to his V for Vendetta character level) and expose the corruption in the racing world.

Speed Racer is a non stop kinetic adventure that just has FUN with the concept of being a live action cartoon. The Wachowskis literally through every penny of their budget into the special effects, making it a visual extravaganza like nothing I have ever seen before. But not only that, they lean very heavily into the comic book cheekiness of the original manga, while utilizing American Saturday morning cartoon aspects to make it more palatable to Western audiences. The end result was a film that the fans of the anime felt wasn’t Japanese enough, and the general populace who just wanted to go see a fun movie couldn’t get over the kitchy nature of the project. But I find that once you accept that you’re watching a Saturday morning cartoon in live action mode, and suddenly the film just feels natural. It’s silly, filled with a ton of great car races, and everyone is just having a ball playing their respective characters. Emile Hirsch has always been an underrated actor in my opinion, and he knocks it out of the park here. John Goodman and Christina Ricci are chewing scenery like they’ve been starving for a year, and Matthew Goode plays the mysterious Racer X to a T with that gravely voice and stoic nature he’s known for. If I had to complain at all about the film, it’s that ending bit where Racer X’s true identity is finally revealed, and he decides to keep it to himself. Almost like they were expecting this to be a mega hit, and a sequel was planned where his identity would come up again. As is, it feels a bit rough and awkward near the end, almost as if it was done intentionally in hopes of said sequel rather than feeling natural.




Rating:

Rated PG for sequences of action, some violence and language





4K Video: Video:

Even though the VC-1 encoded Blu-ray got good reviews back in 2008, it was a slight bit lackluster when compared to modern day mastering techniques and put on 50 gigabyte discs. And while the 4K UHD is only an up convert (the CGI and effects were rendered in 2K if memory serves me correctly), the new 2160p image is nothing short of stunning. Speed Racer is an absolute color bomb of a movie to the extreme, and I mean color BOMB of a film. The flick is intentionally oversaturated to the max, with every bright and bombastic color in the rainbow pushed to such hot levels that they’re virtually glowing, and the HDR/Dolby Vision application does wonders with the colors. They seemed slightly washed out in the Blu-ray, but here they absolutely radiate with a sort of otherworldly energy (yeah, a weird comparison, but you have to see it to understand). Colors are rich and vibrant, while not looking washed out or showing banding. Crush and any other artifacting are basically nonexistent as well. My only complaint here is that the detail level upgrades are not AS amazing as I would have hoped. Especially when it comes to the CGI, which does look a little dated at times (even though it masquerades as a cartoon at times, the CGI looks early 2000s era in some areas, and I mean that in a negative way). But overall this is an utterly stunning 4K UHD release that is going to be demo material for quite some time.









Audio:

One of the biggest disappointments fans of the movie have had to suffer with for 18 years has been the lossy Dolby Digital audio found on the Blu-ray for what was an INSANELY energetic mix in theaters. But Warner Bro’s have rectified that faux pas by including not only a 5.1 DTS-HD MA mix on the 4K UHD disc, but a full fledged Atmos track as well. And boy howdy is it a doozy. I love a 5/5 rated audio mix, and this is full fledged perfection to the core. The mix is absolutely crazy from start to finish, with this sense of full 360 degree immersion in just about every scene. The movie is like 2/3rds races, with roaring engines, throbbing rumbles from the low end of the spectrum, and surrounds (and overheads) that deliver non stop chaos from beginning to end. Dialog is well done as expected, and the low end is powerful (though not as crazy as I might have expected) and I genuinely can find zero fault in the mix. This is just awesome audio goodness, no way around it.













Extras:

• FAST | FUTURE | FAMILY: Speed Racer Revisited
• Speed Racer: Ramping Up!
• Speed Racer: Supercharged!
• Speed Racer: Car Fu Cinema
• Speed Racer: Wonderful World of Racing - The Amazing Racer Family

Final Score: ​

Speed Racer is a gas of a film, and still holds up some 18 years later. I find that the movie has gotten better with time, to the point where I felt like I was in my 20s again. I remember leaving the theater feeling giddy, and I had that same euphoric experience watching it nearly two decades later. The 4K UHD looks gorgeous (despite being an upscale) and the addition of two lossless audio mixes absolutely blows the doors off the aging Blu-ray. Simply put, this is the best the film has ever looked or sounded, and outside of them re-rendering the CGI in 4K, this is about as good as it’s ever going to look. Stellar release for a fun (and under appreciated film in this humble reviewers opinion) film. Highly recommended.


Technical Specifications:

Starring: Emile Hirsch, Matthew Fox, Christina Ricci
Directed by: Lana and Lilly Wachowski
Written by: Lana and Lilly Wachowski, Tatsuo Yoshida (Original Manga)
Aspect Ratio: 2.39:1 HEVC
Audio: English: Dolby Atmos (Dolby TrueHD 7.1 Core), English, DTS-HD MA 5.1, Spanish, French, German, Italian DD 5.1
Subtitles: English SDH, French, German, Italian, Spanish, Dutch
Studio: Warner Bros
Rated: PG
Runtime: 135 Minutes
Blu-ray Release Date: May 19th, 2026

Recommendation: Awesomely Fun Watch