Rotten Tomatoes was there on Friday when Joel Silver confirmed the announcement of Emile Hirsch as the live action "Speed Racer." Then he addressed the Wachowski‘s visual ideas for adapting the anime property.
"First of all, they approach everything from a stand point of story and script," Silver said. "They’re writers first. So the script they wrote is really spectacular and it’s a really great story and incredible characters. And they were impressed by ‘Speed Racer’ because it was the first Japanese animation they saw when they were kids. It was the first time they were aware of a different kind of animation, it made them learn about Japanese animation, so it’s kind of seminal, and they always like the idea of the material, so they’ve always known about it."
Your next Speed Racer, Emile Hirsch
Though the vision is being kept strictly under wraps, Silver has already impressed the suits at Warner Brothers. "I keep showing the studio tests and they sit in their room, and I put the lights down, I show them the test. Everybody just looks at me and they say, ‘Can you show that to us again?’ They can’t believe what they’re seeing. It’s just the way they’re working with images and how they’re putting it together. It’s going to be the first HD movie they’ve ever shot."
Silver also explained the R-rated Wachowskis’ first foray into family film. "They’ve always wanted to make a movie that could be seen by the whole family. Every movie they’ve made have been adult movies. And they’re also great film buffs. They love Capra movies, they wanted to make a movie that could have real sentiment. And they feel that a lot of the adult films they see or are aware of are very cynical. But they feel that when they come to the family movies, some of the animated movies that we see are, they feel they return to a kind of filmmaking that they love, so they feel like they can do that in this movie. It doesn’t have to be a cynical story, it can be a movie that is as human and as accessible, and is sentimental. So you’re going to see a very kind of real story, and then technologically, you’re going to see things that you’ve never even dreamed of, or you’ve seen before."
