Movie Review: 'Need For Speed': Shut Up and Drive Kyle Osborne\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\'s EntertainmentOrDie.Com

By Kyle Osborne

Your brain will say, “Oh, hell no!” but your eyes will say, “Oh, my!”

Apparently, ‘Need For Speed’ is a series of popular video games dating back to 1994. This will already be known to many people, and that knowledge will either heighten their expectations or make them run the other way. For me, ignorance is bliss. I can simply tell you about the movie I saw without comparing, contrasting of even further mentioning the origins. There.

So the movie starts with the kind of immediate sense of dread one got while watching ‘Battleship’: Corny dialog, unrealistic characters, and the sense that not a single thing will happen in the next two hours that you can’t see coming from miles away. You put away your notepad and prepare to fight boredom, if not sleep.

And then it happens—the first of about a half dozen or so spectacular car chase scenes unfolds with the kind of sure-handedness that director Ron Howard applied to last year’s ‘Rush.’ Thrilling, illegal street- racing sequences that have you holding on to your armrests and wincing with every near-miss of obstacles of every variety.

As a director, Scott Waugh shows an uncanny ability to take the ridiculously impossible (cars jumping 50 feet in the air off a modest grass berm, for example) and make your eyes believe what your brain knows perfectly well is impossible. And he does this many times over the course of the film.

Ostensibly, the main attraction will be actor Aaron Paul, in his first starring role since the conclusion of ‘Breaking Bad’ (one of the best TV shows ever) but he isn’t given much to work with. He’s a blue collar mechanic and owner of a failing garage, who makes money on the side racing down two lane blacktops on Saturday nights. It’s the age old story of the talented underachiever who stayed back home in his small upstate New York town, while his hot girlfriend went off to the big city and, of course, became the girlfriend of the movie’s villain, played by Dominic Cooper with oil and slime oozing off of him.

It’s kind of a long, boring story, told with more corn than a Con-Agra plant in Iowa—but it boils down to this: Aaron Paul gets framed for an accidental death and does two years in prison. When he gets out, he and his buddies are going to drive to California to compete in a very high stakes and top secret race that an eccentric organizer (played from a single location by Michael Keaton, having a blast with what was obviously a one day shoot) has invited them to. So the story becomes a sort of ‘Cannonball Run’ race across the country. Aaron Paul and his blonde British passenger (don’t ask, I don’t have the energy) will be chased by hundreds of cops in cars, helicopters—there’s even a foot chase between an officer and that aforementioned blonde lady at a gas station that’s a complete adrenaline rush. For the record, Paul remains a likeable presence, coming across pretty much as you’d expect.

Will our hero make it across the country in time to compete in the race that could change his life? Oh, and did I mention that the slimy villain has also put a “hit” out on him? It’s both cops and robbers on the tail of his two million dollar Shelby Mustang—how in the world can he ever get to his destination?

The short answer to that question involves the viewer locking away his intellect into a box, carefully placing it under his seat, and leaving it there until the unlikely end of the movie, which is, by the way, far too long at slightly more than two hours.

The chases and races are spectacular nail-biters and executed with great skill. The loud engines will rumble your tummy and the hairpin turns will have you leaning to the far left of your chair. As long as everyone is keeping his or her mouth shut, the film cruises comfortably. But each and every “plot development” elicits giggles.

Maybe it is best to apply the same dramatic expectations to this movie as one would to a video game. I mean, it’s not called ‘Need For Credibility’ after all.

And you may just find yourself driving home with a heavier foot than usual. I like it when movies affect my post-viewing behavior.

‘Need For Speed’ is rated PG-13 and earns 2 ½ out of 4 Stars.

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26 thoughts on “Movie Review: ‘Need For Speed’: Shut Up and Drive”

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26 thoughts on “Movie Review: ‘Need For Speed’: Shut Up and Drive”

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