It's a simple enough story, boy drives car good, gets to drive more gooder in the Mario Flower Cup - or the Red Line, and there are no rules except come first. Where everyone uses an enormous amount of weaponry. Also, it's on a hostile planet of robots. Where the start of the race is getting dropped from orbit. And the boy drives a friggin Pontiac Firebird, from space, against flying spacecrafts and transformable robot cars. It's a bit of an underdog story.
Saying this is a mile a minute film is slowing it down to a crawl. You won't have time to get bored, the writing keeps the pace quick and you won't be able to wipe the smirk off your face. Special mention to the "nascar" commentators that narrate the events of the race here, they're an especially nice touch. There's a lot of things played for laughs here, from the promotional work the bigger sponsored racers do, to the amount of effort the robot president puts into wiping those racing scum off his planet, most of which is quite subtle. Up until the last quarter mile anyway, from there, all bets are off.
Even with all those things going on, it never feels unbalanced, it's always about the race. The characters can be a little strange, but they're very human, even the aliens. The boy wants to win the race, the shady mafia boss wants to make money on bets, the robot president of the invaded race planet wants to protect his borders, so ya know, it's sort of relatable stuff.
Hell, it even has a side romance story that isn't shoved down your throat and doesn't feel shoehorned in, how many shows can say that? Don't you wanna see an underdog get the girl and win the race, while everything blows up around him?
You can show this film to Anyone, it doesn't matter if they've seen every anime or none at all. I use this as a newbie breaker if someone asks me about getting into series, and it's in regular rotation for film nights. The first time I saw this I stood up and clapped at the end. It always feels really organic. C'mon, what else are you gonna do in 102 minutes? Just sit back and let the ride take you
