Need For Speed (PG-13)
"The Need for Editing"
Adaption of mid-90s racing videogame staple "The Need for Speed" finds Aaron Paul of Breaking Bad fame behind the wheel of exceedingly expensive muscle cars in a bid to take revenge on his rival for the demise of his ex-girlfriends brother and coworker, whose death he was blamed for. He goes on parole, breaks parole and calls his soon-to-be-British-girlfriend who owns a 3 million dollar Shelby Mustang and proceeds to illegally drive across the country from NY to SF in his bid for vengance against former highschool rival now turned underground racing millionaire celebrity. That's about all the plot that exists in this overlong, over-plot-holed and over-pot-holed road flick.
The film is a hodge podge of everything that could be wrong with a film that will be scrutinized by gear-heads, film-heads or video game fans. Examples include badly scripted characters, including the quirky foriegn accented woman who can recite car statistics like a middle schooler quoting a wikipedia car on horsepower, ooo so empowered! Lighting schemes more distracting than useful with many scenes where the light is extremely artificial looking tied with multiple long closeups during tense driving moments just to spoil the mood! Car physics that defy the laws of, well, you know. Urban driving in souped up EuroUber-cars that is so reckless it would make even the late Ryan Dunn spin in his grave, may he rest in Jack-Ass peace. A thoroughly false sense of reality punctuated by the backfiring blast of unfunny bro-ish hipsterism (both in front and behind the camera), making NFS an exercise in overlong exposure to exhaust fumes with a complete poser at the wheel.
Not that its all skid marks. Aaron Paul's noble attempt at leading man stardom might forever be stunted by Need failure to light up the box office (not as stunted as his facial and vocal range chops, we hope), but he has a certain charm when he's not hoping he looks as cool as Steve McQueen. Then there is the laughably long "emotional" scene of Paul emoting to his "friend"'s fiery death; an emotionally bereft, head grasping, mouth gaping affair. Who is at fault for such a awful film breaking scene, the actor who pulls that face or the director who shoots it in slow motion (or the editor who allows it to linger on screen)? Let's give Paul the benefit of the doubt, he is likable when he is being his natural self. That goes double for the stunts and driving; NFS eschews other racing franchises crutch of CGI car stunts (looking at you recent Fast & Furious') and does it all in camera with real cars to a great grounded effect. The races themselves look good and move well, even if you don't care for those doing it. In fact, besides Paul and his rich co-pilotess played by Imogen Poots (no way that's a stage name!), the cast of actors all have somethings in common. They are all supposed to appeal to a young demographic, are written like stupid frat boys and all have faces that you wouldn't mind see included in a 3-car pile up.
If this movie had trimmed down 15-20 minutes of junk by removing the extraneous "comedy" or "wow cool" bits, focusing instead on the realistic adrenaline junky aspect of speeding down the highway, the movie and its star could have avoided a blowout. Need for Speed even bows to its influences with a nice opening homage to Bullit (1968), one of the most iconic car chases in film history. Unfortunately it soon proceeds a wholesale theft of ideas from decades of other, better car movies (the chained axle cop car from American Graffiti, the evangelical radio DJ from Vanishing Point (with Micheal Keaton, really???), the cross country deadlines and scenery), makes NFS a movie that knows at heart it's unworthy of the legacy, with precious few miles per gallon to show for all the noxious rubber it burns.
4 Refueling with the Car running is a fire hazard guys, especially while going 110 on a highway out of 10 (BAD)
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