Death Race film review

DEATH RACE

I know America's in a mess and its economy is crumbling, but it's about to get a whole lot worse if it's going to end up in the state it's depicted in in Death Race which is set only round the corner in 2012. Replacing American Idol as compulsive viewing is Death Race in which prison inmates race each other in armored vehicles that are virtual arsenals on wheels, with the intention being to kill their fellow competitors. A bit like venturing on American freeways today in fact, so perhaps the film's apocalyptic vision isn't too far fetched.

An entertaining ride, the adrenaline-fuelled Death Race is directed by Paul W.S. Anderson, who has already brought two video games to the screen with Mortal Kombat and Resident Evil. And while it isn't based on a video game, but instead the 1975 film Death Race 2000 starring David Carradine and Sylvester Stallone, Death Race certainly ends up looking like one. The bulk of its refreshingly-brief running time is spent following the cars as they speed around the track in a deadly game of dodgems, set to a pumping soundtrack of music, gunfire and explosions.

Adding a human element to this mechanical mayhem is the perfectly cast Jason Statham. Playing Jensen Ames, a gifted driver who finds himself in prison racing for his life, Statham brings an uncomplicated, authentic toughness that makes you believe in, and root for, his character. He's supported by the colourful Ian McShane as his world-weary mechanic Coach and Joan Allen as the evil prison warden Hennessey.

Ames's life is destroyed when his wife is murdered and her attackers leave him unconscious, clutching the murder weapon for the police to find. When he arrives at Terminal Island prison, Hennessey has an offer for him. If he agrees to don the metal mask that is the trademark of the hugely popular racer dubbed Frankenstein, and win the next heat of Death Race, the pay-per-view series she controls, he can go free. Realizing that Hennessey had orchestrated the murder of his wife and his arrest, Ames warns her, "You wanted a monster. Well, now you've got one."

The only thing in his way is a collection of murderous inmates all vying for their freedom, including Frankenstein's nemesis Machine Gun Joe (Tyrese Gibson). To help him, in addition to his trio of mechanics, is a navigator, the beautiful female inmate Case (Natalie Martinez).