Wanna see cars blow up real good? How ’bout Oscar nominee Joan Allen slinking around as a prison warden with a heart that wishes it was made of something as warm as steel? Or a shirtless Jason Statham bullying his way across the screen as if it owed him a million-dollar debt?
Then step right up to “Death Race,” a cheese-o-rama that wears its Velveeta with pride.
Statham stars as Jensen Ames (how’s that for a tough guy name?), a good man framed for the murder of his beloved wife.
Off he goes to prison, but since this is 2012 and prisons are now run by eeee-vil corporations, he’s in bigger trouble than he thought. He’s offered a get out of jail card by the warden (Allen) who says if he participates in the pay-per-view convict show “Death Race” he can earn his freedom.
The rest of this “Death Race 2000″ update purees metal-crunching action, awful dialogue and hokey supporting players with nicknames like Coach (Ian McShane, slumming and proud of it) and Machine Gun Joe (Tyrese Gibson).
Director Paul W.S. Anderson - never, ever to be confused with Paul Thomas Anderson of “There Will Be Blood” fame - indulges in every action movie cliche while inventing a few more. His camera shakes so much during the hard-charging action sequences that it’s hard to keep one’s equilibrium, but Statham is always on hand to ground the material.
The film flirts with social commentary, but it’s more interested in slow-motion shots of “Death Race’s” beautiful co-stars, like Natalie Martinez. No complaints here.
(Photo: Jason Statham plays a convict driving for his life in “Death Race.”)
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I'm an award-winning journalist and film critic with more than a decade of experience in newspapers, magazines and the Web. I'm a member of both the Washington, DC Area Film Critics Association and the Denver Film Critics Society.
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