Need for Speed doesn’t merely ask you to suspend disbelief. No, it straps your disbelief to a helicopter and dangles it over the Grand Canyon. There’s a complete demolition of disbelief. One that requires so much brain shutting off that it’s almost impossible to enjoy all the macho engine revving. The Fast & Furious 6 infinite runway is far more believable than just about anything that happens in Need for Speed. I guess that’s what we should expect from an adaption of a racing video game.
Tobey (Aaron Paul) is a street racing legend, only he’s never had the proper wheels to really make his dreams come true. He and his friends go to impossible lengths to pull off insane street races. We open with a street race which is run by what appear to be military-grade computer systems, and someone in a Cessna up above spotting for traffic and cops. Bear in mind this race is taking place in a little town in New York. It’s one of those movies where the characters have unlimited resources and yet, are still somehow strapped for cash. Go figure.
While Tobey’s the kind of guy that would pull both friend and foe from burning wreckage, his nemesis Dino (Dominic Cooper) leaves everyone to burn. The consummate bad guy. He might as well come equipped with a pencil-thin mustache to twirl while he cackles about his evil plans. He’s stolen Tobey’s girlfriend, has found fortune in fixing up expensive cars, and races in a super-secret street race called the De Leon.
Speaking of that race, it’s run by the only character that seems to be having any fun in this ridiculous movie. The resurgent Michael Keaton plays the Monarch. A man that no one has met, the pinnacle of anonymity, but he broadcasts his face and voice all over the Internet during his race-centric podcast. We know that the endgame is the De Leon race, but it’s getting there that’s the problem.
With all the gurgling engines, all the spitting tail pipes and the screeching tires, there’s very little else going on. They’ve set up the expected showdown between two rivals. One that is, at the very least, mildly intriguing to see where it leads even though they all eventually lead down the same road. Yet, most of the movie is spent driving cross country as Tobey’s flying friend follows improbably overhead giving him the directions on how to get to the race avoiding minimal traffic. Sure there are some chases along the way, but we know he’s going to make it to the race so what’s the point? The movie tries to build a few characters along the way, and might fool us a time or two into making us think they have. Then Keaton appears on screen, and we realize he’s the only fully realized character and it’s mostly because Keaton is just going completely bonkers.
If you’ve ever played the Need for Speed games you’ll know that you can run into other cars, buses, and even mountains. Your car will flip over, and then it’ll blink and appear right back in the middle of the road so you can keep going. At least the movie retains some sort of realism in that aspect. Although the cops in the movie are just as worthlessly dumb as the ones in the game.
Coming out of Need for Speed with any enjoyment whatsoever requires completely powering down any and all thinking. Don’t question a thing. Don’t question the ludicrously low amount of prison time that is handed down to a person involved in a street race which likely killed half a dozen police officers. Discount the idiocy on display as the movie has you believe that someone can take off and land a plane at will without any communication with any sort of air traffic controllers. Try not to understand the reasoning for such a risky race, where the winner retains all the competitor’s cars, yet it appears very few cars make it through in working condition. Just stop. Don’t think. It’ll hurt. Trust me.
You’re likely going to hear all kinds of auto-related hyperbole about this movie. Something like it’s a “high-octane thrill ride.” Don’t believe it. Need for Speed is yet another movie, in the long line of uninteresting video game adaptions. Not that the movie had much, if anything to live up to. But it’s pretty standard car chase fare all the same.
