It may be only die hard movie buffs know that this weekend's "Death Race" is a remake. The original "Death Race 2000" was a Roger Corman movie, which meant low budget and limited exhibition, even with stars like Sylvester Stallone and David Carradine. The film lives on in DVD, but many audiences may be discovering "Death Race" for the first time with Jason Statham and Tyrese Gibson.
This "Death Race" has been in development for 14 years. Director Paul W.S. Anderson recalled his struggles to reimagine one of his childhood favorites.
"I had lunch with Roger Corman 14 years ago and said, 'I really want to remake "Death Race 2000."'" Anderson said. "He said, 'That's great, kid. We'll make it your next movie.' In typical Hollywood development fashion, 14 years later, we finally made the film but those 14 years, we've had endless conversations with Roger. He's read different versions of the script. He's always made his comments on them."
Anderson has adapted many pre-existing properties to film. He was the first filmmaker to unite "Aliens" and "Predator," as well as make the most successful video game based movies in "Mortal Kombat" and "Resident Evil." Though he has a specific take on each one, Anderson also credits the team attached to each video game or movie franchise for their input.
"It's not like I've been making them in a vacuum, but you do feel responsibility that's for sure because I know there's an existing fan base who love those properties and some people are sacrilege to even touch them. For me, I feel like we have delivered a movie that is different from Roger's movie but is a very, very valid film. Roger put it very nicely actually. He said he loves both films and he said, 'The film I made in 1975, if I was making it now, I'd have made this film.'"
The original "Death Race 2000" was a cross country trip where drivers scored points by running over pedestrians. This "Death Race" is confined to a prison, where inmates drive around a track in armored, weaponized cars. The last driver standing is promised his freedom.
That's not all that's changed. The driver called Frankenstein still wears a mask, but Machine Gun Joe has a new look. Played by Stallone in the original, Tyrese Gibson is this generation's Machine Gun Joe.
"I just know that I had some big shoes to fill," said Gibson. "I ran into Sylvester Stallone when I did the National Anthem for the Floyd Mayweather fight. I was backstage telling him, 'Man, when you see this movie, man, I represented you well.' He was cool with it. I told him, 'Man, I look just like you. I just got a tan.' He was cool with it though."
Gibson did not see the Corman film, nor did Jason Statham, who plays Frankenstein. "Paul asked me not to see it, until after the movie," said Statham. "He just didn’t want anything that would interfere with his idea of the film. It’s not a remake. It’s just an homage. So, he said, 'If you can, try not to see it.'”
The idea to confine the race to a prison came from Anderson's inspiration in the original film. He wanted to know how the cross country Death Race started.
"I was always fascinated with the original movie," said Anderson. "Once you get beyond the nudity, the violence and the cars and how cool it is and how funny it is, it always fascinated me the concept of the Death Race. How did that become the national sport of America? It's not like the American president woke up one morning going, 'I know, we'll have a race across country. People get run down and score points and televise it.' He clearly latched onto something that was a sport or was an underground event and developed it. In the same way that they didn't just build Circus Maximus in Rome. It came out of smaller gladiatorial combats and eventually the coliseum and the Circus Maximus became the main form of entertainment in Rome."
In that way, perhaps Anderson's "Death Race" is a prequel to what might become a cross country race in future installments. "What fascinated me was with the Death Race, how did that originate? How did that actually come into being? That's what I thought our movie should be about was the origin of the Death Race. How, in a very real way, could you imagine that happening? That's what we tried to put on film. Where Roger's movie is an overtly satirical film about the American media, ours tonally is different but I think the criticism of the media and where I think reality television is going is very much implicit in the movie."
The new film benefits from the budgets afforded modern Hollywood productions, but Anderson wanted to maintain certain old school techniques. Instead of relying on computer graphics for the big stunts, he wanted to crash some real cars.
"I've made my fair share of CG movies and I felt for this film, I was heavily influenced by movies made in the '70s and '80s that I grew up watching. Walter Hill's 'The Driver,' Peckinpagh's 'The Getaway,' 'French Connection,' 'Bullitt,' 'Road Warrior,' 'Death Race 2000,' the list goes on. In particular 'Road Warrior' where I remember, I borrowed my mother's Mini to drive to the cinema to go and see it, me and my friends. I remember being so energized when I left the cinema that I just wanted to take that Mini and drive into the side of a truck. I don't get that visceral thrill from many action movies nowadays because it's not real. You can see that it's CG. It's spectacular but you don't have that kind of visceral thrill of seeing real things get crunched up and the real sense of danger that that can give you. I wanted to go back to making one of those movies."
His star agrees. "CGI is so boring," said Statham. "People just switch off to that and I think they know if it’s just a little bit pushed in a direction where it just doesn’t look possible then people are just completely turned off by it. I know Paul wanted to shoot a ton of it, as much as possible, in through the camera lens. It’s always more interesting and that’s what I’ve always wanted to do it with all the action movies that I’m a part of. I like to get stuck in and do the stunts and show that we’re actually doing it because people just switch off. I mean, I personally do. I find CGI very boring. Paul’s very conscious of that and he wanted to shoot real people in real cars doing real stunts and just use a limited amount of CGI."
Sometimes, Anderson's technicians had to draw the line. "Let me tell you, it's a really difficult way to make films," the director said. "You can see why people use a lot of CG because there's nothing easier than shooting an empty plate and creating it all in the computer six months later. To put the stunts in this movie on screen, as spectacular as they are, to do it all for real and not kill anybody was a huge undertaking. Everyone was very excited about the idea of doing that but even our practical effects guys, there were some stunts where they went, 'You know what, Paul? You should probably do this as a miniature.'"
The cars are the stars of the movie. Even the actors know they're playing second fiddle.
"It's boy toys," said Gibson. "This is much crazier than 'Fast and the Furious.' I was in a Mitsubishi. This is like 'Mad Max' steel. I mean, you see my big boy? This is a whole nother level. This to me is like a cross between 'Mad Max' and some elements of 'Shawshank Redemption.' There's like some real heavy, dark performances. Then it's boom, boom, it's crazy."
"It’s a car movie," added Statham. "It’s not 'The Godfather.' Some of the deaths are just gory and hilarious. I like the fact that death can be gruesome and funny. I think it’s important not to take it too seriously. This is entertainment. Everyone who sees it seems to get their money’s worth."
"Death Race" opens Friday.
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