This week is a special week for the Sunday blog post about a
random movie that many could consider a bad movie. This week isn’t just a one movie week. I have three movies that I’m going to write
about. This week, I am covering Death
Race, Death Race 2, and Death Race: Inferno.
Not included in this is Death Race 2000.
I am only dealing with the remake, and its subsequent series of movies.
In 2008, Paul WS Anderson re-imagined Death Race 2000 as a
prison set, dystopian future, racing movie.
The idea behind it was that prisons are run for profit and one of the
ways to create profit was to televise a possibly fatal race between
convicts. This was where the title Death
Race came into play. The races have
characters for the viewer to latch onto.
There is violence and death involved.
It’s exciting for the viewer, but does it make an exciting movie? That’s a tough question to answer and all
comes down to the specific tastes of the person watching the movie.
The prison profit theme runs throughout the entire series as
it sets up the premise of the movies.
Each movie involves races within the prison but also uses this
behind-the-scenes corporation setting to highlight the greed of the prison
system. It gives an interesting twist to
the simplistic “race to the death” storyline that the movies seem like. Don’t misinterpret this, though. The movies are very much highlighting the
action on the track. This is the main
focus, but corporate greed also has a large influence over the story. This is especially apparent when it comes to
the story of the main racing figure, Frankenstein.
Now, before I go any further, I’d like to preface the rest
of this by saying that there will be spoilers for the Death Race series. If you do not want to be spoiled on the
series, watch the movies then come back to my review sort of thing later. The movies are entertaining enough that you
shouldn’t feel as though they are a complete waste of time.
Aside from the story being as much about the races as it is
about the profitability of televising them, the point that hits this home the
most is the use of the Frankenstein costume.
It is made abundantly clear in the Death Race that the Frankenstein
racing character can be played by anyone.
He is simply a man behind a mask.
Anybody could be behind that mask.
Frankenstein is a legend that can live beyond the convict chosen to play
him. This comes into play very early as
Jason Statham’s character Jensen Ames is only the newest racer in a long line
of racers to be behind the mask. In the
opening scene of the movie, the original Frankenstein dies. Jensen Ames is framed for murder and forced
into racing for the prison simply because he was a great racer at one time in
his life. A better racer means a better
race and that means better ratings. This
can only lead to more profit. It also
helps that this great racer can hide behind a mask and become one of the
favourite characters in Death Race history.
This idea of Frankenstein being a figure rather than a
specific person in order to achieve more profit is only further solidified
through the two direct-to-video sequels, Death Race 2 and Death Race:
Inferno. Death Race 2 tells the story of
the original Frankenstein and how he became Frankenstein. Luke Goss stars as Carl Lucas, a getaway
driver who is caught after a bank heist gone wrong. Though the acting in Death Race 2 isn’t on
the same level as the previous film, it hits the capitalism point better. Instead of simply brushing over how the idea
of the races came to be, this movie fleshes out the inception of the prison
system getting to that point. It taps
into the societal interest in violence and death, as well as the exploitation
of people for higher profit. This movie
expands on this idea in a way that Death Race did not. It also leads Carl Lucas down the path that
caused him to become Frankenstein. In
Death Race: Inferno, the character of Frankenstein exists. Carl Lucas is still Frankenstein. What the third installment in the series
brings to the table is the idea of franchise expansion and what it brings in
terms of monetary gain. Though this is
much more focused on character relationships than the second film, it still
brings up some interesting ideas when it comes to capitalism.
Death Race: Inferno better exemplifies the concept of
Frankenstein being a symbol than the second
film. There are many instances
throughout the story in which Carl Lucas is threatened by the man running the
race and told that he could be killed and replaced easily, with Frankenstein
coming out alive from a fatal accident to help solidify the mythology of the
character. This is only further backed
up by the final twist in the film being the fact that someone else is now
taking the place of Carl Lucas as Frankenstein following a seemingly fatal
accident.
There have been other movies that have covered the same
ground as the Death Race movies in a better way. There is no denying that. However, the Death Race series is interesting
in how it brought those aspects to the forefront, while mixing them with the
bloody, explosive action of prison inmates racing for their lives. The thought that was put into the two sequels
elevates them to be a little bit better than most direct-to-video movies. They deserve praise for that.
There are a few notes that I would like to make:
- Two actors were featured in all three Death Race movies. These actors were Robin Shou, and Fred Koehler.
- Danny Trejo, Luke Goss, Ving Rhames, Tanit Phoenix, Tanya van Graan, Michael Dube, Quentin Chong, and Louis Joubert were in both Death Race 2 and Death Race: Inferno.
- Lauren Cohan, Chase Armitrage, and Michael Solomon were in Death Race 2, and had archive footage from that movie shown in Death Race: Inferno.
- If you have any suggestions for future movies in the Sunday "Bad" Movies posts, feel free to leave a comment or message me on Twitter.
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