Fans of the original 1970’s Death Race 2000 will love this movie.
Death Race 2050 is set in a quasi-post Apocolpytic America. The United States of America has become The United Corporations of America, and the rest of the movie is Orwellian too. Malcolm McDowell sets the tone as The Chairman, and the jokes, schlock and satire rolls out non-stop from the very beginning. It’s refreshing to know that a movie in 2017 is truly self aware.
Death Race 2050 parallels the plot of the 1975 original. Teams of drivers compete in a cross county derby and attempt to murder as many men, women and children with their cars along the way. Offing senior citizens earns the driver even more points. It is ridiculous as it sounds. The drivers and their co-pilots are over the top, with names like Frankenstein and Jed Perfectus. A renegade faction of inept survivors pledges to end the most watched event in television in history. Chaos ensues.
I enjoyed this movie.
Right off the bat, Death Race 2050 draws a line in the sand. The viewer either knows what they are getting into and is immediately along for the ride. Or, you stumbled into a movie that you have no understanding of and you walk out of the theater. If campy humor, political satire, and senseless nudity isn’t your thing, you are in the later group.
Director G.J. Echternkamp and legendary producer Roger Corman don’t pull any punches. It’s a bold move to make such a non-PC movie in 2017. Overtly racist black female rappers mowing down redneck hillbillies, sexually ambiguous jocks, and sentient death dealing driverless cars all make an appearance…. and that’s just the tip of the ice berg. “Death Race is a car-racing picture with some black humor,” Corman told the LA Weekly. “But underneath all that, the movie reflects something of today’s world, which is a little bit darker than the world when I made the original.”
The newer Death Race also takes gender issues head on.
A movie of it’s times, the 1970’s movie largely portrayed women as sex objects. Drivers were rewarded with sex and pampering at the end of a long day of day of driving and killing. Writers, G.J. Echternkamp and Matt Yamashita handle the female lead role, Annie Sullivan, (Marci Miller) with deftness. In the 2017 Death Race, Sullivan is an empowered woman and plays a vital part in the plot development. And she does it all without flashing any skin… Ok, there is a fantastic shot of her ass bending over the car, but this a Death Race movie after all.
Death Race 2050 is an equal opportunity offender. If you can’t take jabs at the POTUS, or high drama gay men, or women who are required to fake oragsms, or religion, or virtual reality, or just about ANYTHING, then move on. This is not the movie for you. Fans of grind house sleeze from the 1970’s will find this to be a very refreshing entry into the 2017 catalog. Social commentary is the real star of the show. To quote the Chairman; “This is all about freedom. The freedom to sit on your BIG FAT ASS and watch…”
