But the star is David Carradine ( Kung Fu, Carquake, Kill Bill ) as Frankenstein who confidently carries the film. The cast famously includes a pre - Rocky Sylvester Stallone, then in danger of being typecast as Italian hoodlums. There’s a fantastic wide-angle shot of David Carradine at the wheel while a micro-fighter-plane buzzes low over him in a perfectly symmetrical money shot. There’s no back projection – the actors simply keep acting while they’re driving. The cinematography for the action scenes is tight, with dynamic wide angles, and cameras bolted onto the cars to keep you in the action. Fast editing includes all the viewpoints and tries not to miss any of the improvisations or any last word from the witty script. The racers continue to knock down the foolhardy citizens who venture onto the streets, while the organisers try and prevent the race itself getting wrecked.Ī simple enough premise, but with interweaving stories running around all the competitors, the organisers and the saboteurs. The film is presented by three characters that lampoon both sport and chat show hosts. Besides a cowgirl (Calamity Jane) and a Nazi (Mathilda the Hun), there’s a Roman hero (Nero), a 1920s gangster (Machine Gun Joe Viterbo) and a sci- fi monster (Frankenstein), the latter a patchwork cyborg pieced together after previous car crashes.īut as soon as the race gets underway, saboteurs try to challenge the world president and bring down the institution of the Death Race. The cars have blades, missile launchers and teeth, to maximise their killing potential, and are all themed to reflect the cartoony characters of the drivers.
The film portrays a future where the annual Death Race sends five cars coast-to-coast across America in search of first place or the highest score – points won for pedestrians killed, higher scores for those of least use to the State.
I put on one of my Dad’s jackets to try and look old enough to get in – it worked! Back then, Death Race 2000 was seen as a cash-in on the big-budget Rollerball – another future vision of televised sport that incorporated onscreen murder to satiate the masses and somehow provide an alternative to warfare and civil unrest.īut where Rollerball was quite dry and downbeat, Death Race 2000 delivered sex and violence, while delivering a satirical black comedy with a cheeky anti-violent message!
Death race 2000 dvd movie#
Over 30 years ago this was the first adult movie I ever sneaked into. Even sitting in the car, I keep hearing passengers making jokes about pedestrians being worth different amounts of ‘points’, without knowing the film that started it all. But it seems that video games like Carmageddon have stolen its thunder without much respect. I thought this would be better known nowadays.
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