Movie Review: Cars

http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0317219/

Opens in Korea on 20 July 2006

Box Office opening weekend in USA 60 Million $
http://www.boxofficemojo.com/movies/?id=cars.htm

How I saw it. KVCD SCREENER.

Plot: Cars Is the saga of Lightning McQueen, a hot-shot animated stock-car voiced by actor Owen Wilson. In route to a big race, the cocky McQueen gets waylaid in Radiator Springs, where he finds the true meaning of friendship and family.

The first time I saw the preview for this film, huge red flags went up. I am a boy from the Southern USA, So I have grown up watching racing, and just the thought of PIXAR even atempting anything dealing with racing, just did not quite sound right to me.

I am so glad that I was wrong on this ocassion, the film is awesome!

To be honest I caught all of the winks and nods towards National Association for Stock Car Auto Racing (NASCAR) http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nascar I have no idea if those outside the USA will and that might be a problem in understanding the film.

The film opens up with a huge race with Lightning McQueen, a rookie race car in the Piston Cup race. Extremely overconfident, arrogant, and disrespectful towards his pit crew, he cares little for others, interested only in becoming the first rookie to win the Piston Cup and gaining a lucrative endorsement deal from Dinoco. However, the race ends with a three-way tie between McQueen, perennial runner-up and cheater Chick Hicks (Michael Keaton), and veteran The King. (Richard Petty)

I loved the way that the used Richard Petty 1970 Plymouth Superbird modeled after Petty’s #43. He used to race the same car in NASCAR events, so it was great so see him as the car. (Please clink on link to see who R. Petty is. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Richard_Petty

Now here is a rather long explanation for all of or readers you do not follow American Car Racing.

Individual characters

The name of the main character, Lightning McQueen, is a tribute to Glenn McQueen, a Pixar animator who died in 2002. The name is also reminiscent of actor Steve McQueen, himself an accomplished auto and motorcycle racer, who starred in several car movies, and topic of a Sheryl Crow hit video. Lightning McQueen’s original number was to be 57, after director John Lasseter’s birth year, 1957; it was later changed to 95 to represent the year that Toy Story was released. His car has elements of many sports cars. A full size tour car is based on a Firebird. Modern NASCAR bodies must all have the same shape, differentiated only by the painting of headlights and grille openings. The Piston cup features cars based on various NASCAR racers since the 1970s.
Sally, the romantic interest is a stock Porsche Carrera. Normally, a Carrera’s tail only pops up at highway speeds, but she purposely raises it when she wants to show a little striping.

Richard Petty’s Superbird at the Petty Museum

The King, voiced by Richard Petty, is Petty’s 1970 Plymouth Superbird, #43 in “Richard Petty Blue”, built to beat Ford and bring Petty back to prominence. The goalpost wing and shark nose were so fast they were banned, and started a trend of slowing cars down to speeds below 200 MPH. Petty was known as the King on the NASCAR Winston Cup Circuit, because he won the Winston Cup seven times. The crash sequence for “The King” appears to be a remake of Petty’s 1988 crash at the Daytona 500.
Chick Hicks is 86, a reference to Luxo Jr., the first Pixar short, released in 1986. Chick’s body closely resembles the Quaker State Buick Regal that Ricky Rudd drove in the 1980s, though Pixar animators have said the character is a generic 1980′s stock car. Michael Keaton was also in Herbie Fully Loaded, another NASCAR-themed Disney movie.
Rusty & Dusty Rust-eze (the cars seen in front of McQueen’s trailer after the race) are direct parodies of Click & Clack, The Tappet Brothers from the radio show Car Talk. They even say their trademark phrase used to end their show, “Don’t drive like my brother!” as Mack is leaving the track. They are also voiced by the Tappet Brothers themselves: Ray & Tom Magliozzi. The characters were also originally named Clink and Clunk.

Old Master Doc Hudson’s plate is “51HHMD,” which stands for “1951 Hudson Hornet, M.D.” His record of 27 wins in a single season is the same as that of the 1952 Hudson racing team, and his championships are the same years as the Hudson team.
The sheriff is voiced by Michael Wallis, renowned author of The Mother Road series of books about historic Route 66.
Fillmore, the VW Bus voiced by George Carlin, has license plate “51237″ representing Carlin’s birth date: May 12, 1937. His license plate dangles below his front bumper, forming a goatee typical of the 1960s hippies which the car represents. Fillmore’s character is actually an impression of Tommy Chong‘s hippie of the Cheech and Chong comedy record duo. The name Fillmore is a reference to Fillmore East and West – the concert hall where many artists during the 1960′s and 1970′s performed. The Fillmore is located in San Fransisco which was considered a hippy haven in the 60′s.
The name and voice for the character Darrell Cartrip, a retired race car who now does race commentary, is a pun on, and is provided by, Darrell Waltrip, a retired NASCAR driver who now does race commentary for the FOX network. Darrell Cartrip is similar to the 1976 Chevy Monte Carlo with stacked rectangular headlights that he raced in 1977 and 1978. Many times throughout his career, Darrell Waltrip raced in a car bearing the number 17, such as when he drove for his own team in 1975, when he drove for Rick Hendrick and Tide in the latter part of the 1980s, and when he again owned his own team in the 1990s with Western Auto as a sponsor. The character also features a flame paint job, for which Darrell has a fondness. During the final race, when the green flag falls for the first time, Darrell Cartrip yells “Boogity boogity boogity!” Waltrip’s real catchphrase in the booth, which he utters at the start of every race.

The #58 “Octane Gain” racecar in the film’s first race appears to be a Toyota Camry, which NASCAR will start using in 2007.

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http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cars_%28film%29
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Please see the movie, I think that you will like it. I HOPE THE BACKGROUND INFO helps. AND STAY FOR THE CREDITS. During the end credits, scenes from previous Pixar films are re-enacted with cars. There is a scene from Toy Car Story featuring Tom Hanks (as a Ford Woodie) and Tim Allen, one from Monster Trucks, Inc. featuring John Goodman and Billy Crystal, and one from A Bug‘s Life featuring Dave Foley. John Ratzenberger is also featured in all three scenes, and his Cars character Mack comments on the recurrence, from supportive at first to disgust.

Grade A.

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