Amid the overly earnest tone, (almost) squeaky-clean humor and familiar messages about teamwork and integrity is the rare film family that's as strong at the start as they are by the end.

| May 29, 2013

You have to be 12 to like it, and I have to say there is little or nothing here to remind us why we were all quite so excited about The Matrix.

| Original Score: 2/5 | Oct 18, 2008

| Original Score: C+ | Oct 18, 2008

Twelve-year-old boys should be wowed, but for the rest of us, it will depend on your appetite for eye candy.

| Oct 18, 2008

Even the target audience of 10-year-olds might get jimmy legs sitting for a punishing 135 minutes as the Wachowski brothers projectile-vomit their cotton-candy dreams all over the big screen.

Full Review | Original Score: 2/4 | Oct 18, 2008

Given that Speed Racer itself is basically an elaborate commercial, the anti-corporate message inevitably rings hollow.

| Original Score: 3.5/5 | Jun 12, 2008

I love the look and the style and the spirit of this film.

Full Review | May 12, 2008

Speed Racer creates a timeless, visually seductive world suspended somewhere between the pop '60s and the sci-fi future. Its biggest disappointment, strangely enough, is its raison d'tre -- the races themselves.

| May 12, 2008

Speed Racer intends to convey a sense of heedless momentum, but it drags painfully.

| May 9, 2008

This toxic admixture of computer-generated frenzy and live-action torpor succeeds in being, almost simultaneously, genuinely painful -- the esthetic equivalent of needles in eyeballs -- and weirdly benumbing, like eye candy laced with lidocaine.

| May 9, 2008

More than the story of the Racer family, Speed Racer is the visual autobiography of the Wachowskis and their pit crew of computer-nerd Einsteins, using the tools of their trade to transform the movie medium.

| May 9, 2008

For a movie about velocity, the excitement factor is low and the races feel like a drag.

Full Review | Original Score: 1.5/4 | May 9, 2008

The movie, unfortunately, doesn't make that leap from sensation to art, but it suggests fascinating possibilities for moviemakers interested in using the latest techniques seriously to explore the world -- the fairyland we have made with our technology.

| Original Score: 2.5/4 | May 9, 2008

Shapes hurtle toward you, then recede abruptly, each bearing some fragment of narrative information that has now passed you by forever. Nausea and anxiety begin to wash over you in overlapping waves.

| May 9, 2008

The actors seem lost in a gumball dispenser; the audience, for the most part, might well feel the same way.

Full Review | Original Score: 2/4 | May 9, 2008

Someday, real artists may come along to use some of the techniques that the Wachowskis are developing. Then things will get interesting.

| Original Score: 2/4 | May 9, 2008

The movie makes you crave a streamlined story, interesting characters and a joystick.

| Original Score: 0.5/4 | May 9, 2008

Writer-directors Larry and Andy Wachowski, the creators of the Matrix films, once again invent stunning visual tricks in this adaptation of the late-'60s Japanese anime.

| Original Score: 3/5 | May 9, 2008

The fakeness of it all overwhelms, dampening any real excitement. It's hard to care about characters so stiff and one-dimensional they out-cartoon the cartoon originals.

| Original Score: 2/5 | May 9, 2008

It gave me a headache, a stomach ache and the less-defined unease that comes from witnessing a major change in the zeitgeist. Because the zeitgeist, judging from this movie, now embraces rattle-headed visual delirium at all costs.

| Original Score: 2/4 | May 9, 2008