I didn’t think I’d enjoy this movie as much as I did! If I’m totally honest, I was planning on waiting until it came out on Redbox, and even then, I only wanted to see this movie because in the trailer there was a fleeting moment of Michael Keaton as some sort of announcer. I love Michael Keaton. Like, the “my boyfriend has banned me from talking about Michael Keaton” kind of I love Michael Keaton.
I ended up seeing this the night it premiered, in the ETX theater, at the 12.00 show, thanks to my boyfriend’s need to see the movie. This was my first ETX movie!! We saw it in 3D and complete surround sound. The boyfriend fell asleep during it (it was late, I’ll give him that) but I was awake for the whole thing and I loved it! There was plenty of Michael Keaton in it! Turns out he’s a major character in the film. Kind of. He’s a race creator/announcer/watches car videos on the internet a lot??? Not entirely sure how it works but hey. Michael Keaton.
I’m not a car fan in any sense of the word – I can barely tell you what make and model I drive myself – nor would I consider myself a gamer. This movie is both of those things. It’s based off that arcade game that I’m crap at where you do illegal street races or something, I think. Like a kid-friendly GTA. Maybe. I’m not sure. However, I still really enjoyed the movie. Like, four out of five stars enjoyed the movie. While I’m not a fan of cars or video games, everything else in the movie took over for me. The story was compelling, the characters relatable, and the race scenes were phenomenal.
The characters were hilarious, especially the rest of Aaron Paul’s crew. Kid Cudi was really funny, as were Rami Malek and Ramon Rodriguez. I spent most of the time, however, trying to discern if the British girl (Imogen Poots)’s accent was real or not, because it sounded very London, and very fake. But, according to IMDb, she’s actually from London and just has the misfortune of sounding like a very stereotypical Brit.
After, I talked it over with a couple of the bf’s friends and they completely nerded out over it because they’re big car fans. Especially one of them, he started trying to talk to me about the types of cars in the film and I was like “uh, they’re ugly European ones? That go really fast? I don’t know but HOWARD STARK DRIVES ONE OF THEM.”
Either way, go see this movie. Even if you hate cars, even if you hate video games. Even if, dare I say it, you hate Michael Keaton. The film was crisp, the colours bright, and the storyline pulled me in to the point of being on the edge of my chair chanting at one point, and I raved about it on facebook for days. If you like yourself, see this movie. If you love yourself, see it in ETX.
Ellen Watches Movies 