Death Race (2008)

Whenever I hear that Hollywood is taking a classic and giving it the remake treatment, I‘m immediately filled with a sense of dread. In the case of Death Race, a reinvention of Roger Corman’s Death Race 2000, my fear was also mixed with a certain level of visceral excitement.

In the original, racers competed to be the first to win the brutal Transcontinental Road Race. Along the way, they could also pick up additional points by mowing down civilians with their cars. I have to admit that I was looking forward to seeing this bloody spectacle updated with modern visual effects.

I should’ve known better. Not content to stick with the excellent formula of the original, writer/director Paul W.S. Anderson set about updating the story. In Death Race, the cross-country element has been replaced with a gladiatorial pay-per-view race held on Terminal Island, one of America’s major prison facilities (now run by the corporations). Inmates are paired up with female navigators (also prisoners), and set loose for a grueling marathon of destruction. While drivers don’t get extra points for killing opponents or bystanders, that doesn’t stop the blood from flowing in copious amounts. And any driver who wins five races is guaranteed to gain their freedom–not a bad incentive for a mass murderer doing consecutive life sentences.

Enter Jensen Ames (Jason Statham). Since he’s portrayed by Statham, a man well-known for his driving skills in the Transporter franchise, viewers should quickly get the idea that our hero is pretty skilled behind the wheel of a car. He’s also a decent guy; we know this because the movie beats us over the head with it for the first 20 minutes. The script even has the gall to include the line, “You’re a good man, Jensen Garner Ames.”

Times are tough, though: Ames’s license has been revoked, and he’s just lost his job. Luckily, he’s able to go home to a beautiful wife and adorable baby girl, but his good fortune on the homefront doesn’t last for long. His wife turns up dead from multiple stab wounds, and Ames is convicted of her murder. He’s promptly shipped to Terminal Island where (you guessed it) Warden Hennessey (Joan Allen) wants him to compete in the upcoming Death Race. The remainder of the film focuses on his attempts to stay alive–both on and off the track–and be reunited with his daughter.

Part of the fun of this type of film is watching the protagonist go toe-to-toe with the assortment of villains arrayed against him. While Death Race 2000 pitted its hero Frankenstein (David Carradine) against the cartoonish likes of Matilda the Hun and Calamity Jane, the remake sets Ames against far less likable opponents including:

• Machine Gun Joe (Tyrese Gibson) – Ames’s chief competition on the track, Joe drives a huge truck armed with machine guns. He’s also the only driver with a male co-pilot, due to his habit of getting navigators killed (and his reported homosexuality).
• Grimm (Robert LaSardo) – A psycho with three life sentences. Believes the warden is the reincarnation of the Hindu goddess of death.
• Travis Colt (Justin Mader) – A former NASCAR racer with a violent temper and vehicular manslaughter conviction.
• 14K (Robin Shou) – Has a degree from MIT and is a 10th-generation member of the Triad.
• Pachenko (Max Ryan) – A white supremacist responsible for nine kills in Death Race events.

There are others, of course, but the above lunatics provide the main competition for Ames. Throughout the film, viewers will be treated to these men dying in ways ranging from the mundane to the truly creative. After all, what’s a Death Race without a little death?

If you’re looking for some mindless mayhem, Death Race may not be a bad selection. The on-track action has a certain primitive charm, and Anderson keeps the camera relatively steady so viewers can understand what’s going on. Joan Allen and Ian McShane lend respectability to the proceedings, although actors of their caliber should be getting far better offers than this.

Most of the problems with Death Race occur off the racetrack. The dialogue is uninspired, the plot is predictable, and the climax stretches the boundaries of logic to the breaking point. The final scene, in particular, is just annoyingly contrived.

We’re also treated to a cavalcade of prison movie clichés: the noble con (McShane), the innocent con (Natalie Martinez), and the con who appears unusually brilliant amidst a sea of sub-humans (Frederick Koehler). I guess we shouldn’t expect much more, but it’s always annoying when Hollywood phones it in and doesn‘t appear to care whether we notice or not.

Despite its problems, Death Race does achieve a certain level of dumb success. The girls are hot, the gunfire loud, and the deaths big and bloody. I don’t know if our society will ever devolve to the point of televising live gladiatorial events, but fans of this film will probably be the first in line.