I have to admit, I’m a bit confused. This movie has been supported by NASCAR, and NASCAR has been hyping up the movie as a way to reach out to new fans, to go mainstream, as it were. The movie is really pretty good, and I’m happy I saw it, but it doesn’t really help the image of NASCAR at all. In fact, many of the jokes come at the expense of NASCAR stereotypes, and very little of the sport comes through in the movie.
In fact, as I watched the film, I couldn’t help think about how some things just wouldn’t happen in the NASCAR we know today. Ricky Bobby’s crew chief is black. There are no black crew chiefs in NASCAR. The driver that supplants Ricky Bobby is openly gay and French. Riiight. We won’t even get into Ricky Bobby, his wife, or the rest of the characters that also play on stereotypes. Stereotypes make the jokes more accessible, though, and I’m not faulting the movie for playing on them. I’m just curious about why NASCAR was pushing the film so much.
Less forgivable for a movie that’s supposed to help raise awareness of NASCAR, there’s nothing about the fandom of NASCAR or the sport. No stories about fans that drive hundreds of miles to see a NASCAR event, the crashes were incidental, and there’s nothing about the technology of the cars. Most of the people I know that like NASCAR like it for one of those reasons, so I’m not sure what was there to draw new fans in.
All of that doesn’t change how good the movie is, and it’s just plain good. Like Anchorman, another Will Ferrell movie also directed by Adam McKay, Talladega Nights has a good story with lots of completely random bits thrown in. Try and make sense of the film and you’re going to be disappointed, but just go along for the ride and you’ll have a great time. Even though there wasn’t a NASCAR fan in our group, we all liked the movie. Of course, all of us walked out with our opinions of NASCAR unchanged.
Ratings
As always, here’s Stephanie Zacharek’s review at Salon.com.
August 8th, 2006 at 1:03 pm
Maybe I should wear one of those checker flag designed ribbons to raise NASCAR awareness. Why should we raise NASCAR awareness at all? Our culture right now is headed from one of popularity to obscurity and to make a dent in that is more an uphill battle now than ever. Used to be you had a one in three chance of liking the same television shows. Now its 1 in 500. So good luck with raising awareness through the media. At least they didn’t do ANOTHER movie about football.
As far as your first paragraph goes, it seems to me that your argument is that the characters in the movie both affirm and deny stereotypes. The gay Frenchmen and black Crew Chief deny while many of the other characters affirm the term “redneck.” Although no one that I could see had that telltale skool can in the back pocket.
For the NASCAR crowd, I think they will probably like the movie because Will Farrell is not seen as completely perverse, though some might find exception with the humor regarding “grace” and even I wasn’t even too happy with the “man kissing” which I found uneccessary and I had to avert my gaze.
I found the scene with Ricky Bobby running around the track thinking he was on fire hilarious though. And crying out for Tom Cruise to save him. It was a priceless moment, one that shows that at least Hollywood has some connection with reality.
As far as NASCAR itself goes, I had a friend in college who breathed it so I know a few things about ground effects, drafting, and regulations regarding weight, torque, and such. I have also attended two NASCAR races and one was the Daytona 500 and there was a lot more material to be had by simply attending one of the events. You could do at least 30 minutes on how bad the food is, and of course there is the dialog between the drivers and crew you can hear if you pick up a radio.
In some ways being rookie in the NASCAR world is similar to being a n00b in the computer world. That being said, the movie has moments of originality and humor that are getting to be trademarks of Farrell and McCay. As Joel Siegel would say “Start Your Engines for Talledega Nights!”
August 11th, 2006 at 4:32 am
I found the movie to me a total fabrocatation of NASCAR. I live in Oxford Alabama about 10 miles from Talladega Super Speedway and I am not a big race fan. I found the movie to be really crude. I should have been rated R. I was there with my youngsters at our local drive in and no one was laughing very much. Yes the part where he was running around in his underwear was priceless and I did laugh at it but the rest us just crude. I guess being from the area where the film is named makes it hard to take. But I did like seeing the Speedway scenes. My kids went wild when they saw it as well as all the other kids at the drive in but the the kiss happened and they were all screamming yuck that’s nasty and gross. It was funny hearing them yelling that. Anyway the movie way bad and I wouldn’t take anyone under 15 to it.