So much for Peter Bart’s pet dead horse about the untraversable gap between ticket buyers and film reviewers––Iron Man, so far the year’s best reviewed film, is also thus far 2008’s fastest moneymaker. The critic/audience sync continued this past weekend with Speed Racer. It takes a rare film to unite critics with as disparate a sensibility as Anthony Lane and Armond White in common vitriol; it’s almost unthinkable that the same critically-despised film would fail to appeal to the masses.

“Speed Racer kills cinema,” went White’s fuming, unusable pullquote. But does it? It would be wishful thinking to assume that the average ticket buyer actually cares about “cinema”, never mind the death thereof, but it seems clear to me that the audience’s failure to care about this particular movie could have lasting repercussions for those of us who do take cinema seriously. After jump, you’ll find five reasons why, love the movie or hate it, this bombing could potentially be Bad For Movies on the whole––and one reason why it might be kind of good. As usual, feel free to tell me why I’m a moron in the comments.

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• At the Risky Biz blog, Steven Zeitchik accuses the Wachowskis of “insidious” product placement in Speed Racer, altering the design of Speed’s helmet and the Mach 5 to subliminally invoke corporate partner McDonalds. “It may not be brand placement. It’s something much newer and trickier: brand suggestion.”
• FILMMAKER Magazine’s website has published the essay by David Gordon Green from the liner notes of the recently-released Benten DVD of Todd Rohal’s The Guatemalan Handshake. His first impression of that film? “I had a queer anxiety in my stomach that in fact the movie was “too good,” or should I say “special,” like a retarded kid who is enchanting and liberating in his or her world view, destined for a conflict with the traditional culture.”
• Movie viral marketing or fan fic? It’s too early to tell, but two G.I. Joe characters have started Twittering. GeneralHawk’s latest update: “Having a late lunch at Bennigan’s with Snake-Eyes & Alpine. Alpine says The Roots newalbum is, quote, ‘Dope.’” [Tipped by Kevin]

For their latest appropriation, The Wachowski Brothers have attempted to replicate the candilicious sense of J-Pop as only a Western, green-screen-happy directing duo can. Courtesy of AOL, here is the first trailer for their Speed Racer, technically the first movie from them as directors since The Matrix trilogy, and it looks like the boys might be trying too hard. From the blurred-background pans to the shot of Spritle and Chim-Chim in the trunk, this looks like a perfect live-action take on the classic anime series. But it also looks like a wannabe cartoon, and with so much CGI, it’s difficult to take seriously.

Nonetheless, my eyeballs are begging for me to take them to see this the first chance I get.

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