I’ve been dipping into the occasional anime lately, and whenever I do one or more of you seems to recommend REDLINE (2009). I’ve been sold for a while, but every time I’ve thought to rent it it’s been checked out. Then I saw that it was playing in a series of anime screenings at my favorite Seattle theater (SIFF Cinema Downtown, f.k.a. Cinerama). I knew the visuals would be better on the big screen, but it didn’t occur to me the that sound would be the most important part until the bass from (music by James Shimoji, SURVIVE STYLE 5+) started thumping in my chest. It’s a racing movie, so the roaring engines are crucial as well, but that danceable techno beat is the key. I definitely wouldn’t have enjoyed this as much turning the volume down out or respect for the neighbors.

It’s set in the future, when intergalactic travel is old hat. The opening text notes that despite civilization having moved beyond the wheel, there are still “fools” who celebrate it in car races. I like how this frames the subject as old school people outside of the mainstream, passionately dedicated to something they’ve been told is obsolete. Very relatable! But this really doesn’t seem like a niche hobby. When our hero unexpectedly qualifies for the titular elite competition reporters mob him like he found a Golden Ticket.

He’s called JP, a walking personification of rebel coolness who’s on parole (because he took the fall for someone else fixing a race), drives an incredibly souped-up TransAM, wears a leather jacket with spikes on the shoulder, and boasts a pompadour that must be at least 2 feet tall. He’s also called “Sweet JP” and the internet says his full name is Joshua Punkhead. When he’s not racing he drives a hoverbike that’s even more audaciously proportioned than his hair.

JP has a manager called Frisbee who has convinced him to collude with the repulsive yakuza boss Inuki for betting purposes. His brilliant mechanic Mogura disapproves of this but keeps working with him out of respect for his skills.

The movie begins with a race called the Yellowline, which takes place on Dorothy, a planet of dog-people. And we start with them, just ordinary citizens chattering about the race that’s coming to their town, and then being thrilled by the 2-second experience of the cars zooming past them and blowing their fur back.

It’s kind of impossible to watch this without thinking of the podrace in THE PHANTOM MENACE. It has a similar appeal: this strange collection of alien weirdos so proud of their power-guzzling contraptions, glorified with all the fanfare of color commentary and onscreen graphics, and the team of artists at the Madhouse animation studio calling upon all their best visual, aural and editing chops to create the cinematic illusion of overwhelming speed. We see the vehicles streaking by, blurring our vision, kicking up dust and debris. We also spend lots of time up close with the drivers in their cockpits, vibrating, rattling, sweating, gritting their teeth, gripping their wheels, keeping it all under control (or not). Style is of utmost importance so there’s a preference for odd angles and fish-eye effects, with limbs stretching toward the camera like they’re a mile long.

This is the finals. The goal is not so much to win the Yellowline as to qualify for the Redline. JP is supposed to throw the race and come in second, but he tries to win anyway, so Frisbee blows up his car, and the winner is a little green and pink haired genius of a driver named Sonoshee McLaren, driving a hovercar called Crab Sonoshee. She doesn’t know the media has nicknamed her “Cherry Boy Hunter.” Does that mean what I think it means?

JP is in the hospital ready to hang it up when he learns that he still qualified for Redline due to two drop outs. The location was announced as Roboworld, whose president has refused permission, saying it’s a sacred monument to peace so (obviously) his military will attack anyone who comes there. Two of the drivers didn’t want to deal with that, and Frisbee doesn’t either, so JP says yes on live TV.

The racers prepare on a refugee moon called EUЯPSS, the cyborgs of Roboworld fret about their military secrets being exposed by sports broadcasts, there’s a scheme to sabotage Roboworld’s Orbital Disintegration Cannon so they can’t blow up the Redline mothership, and of course lots of F1: THE MOVIE type shit like JP hiring a junk dealer named Old Man Mole to reconfigure his car in a way that sounds impossible, and also falling in love with Sonoshee, who doesn’t know she inspired him to race. Yeah, there’s plenty of plot, but I’m more into the DEATH RACE 2000/Wacky Racers worldbuilding shit: who is this driver called MachineHead, or the fascist cop racer Gori-Rider, or the bio-weapon code named Funky Boy, or Princess Supergrass? There are types of art where the amount of weird guys that show up is almost as important than the story.

In this one, though, the top priority is the energy and exuberance of the animation. In the first racing scene we get the REDLINE equivalent of those shots in the early THE FAST AND THE FURIOUS movies where the camera flies inside the engine for us to see how it works. Instead of just pushing the NOS button, this involves pulling a piece out of the steering wheel and inserting a capsule of some powerful energy source that drops in and combusts. I believe Rob Cohen (and definitely John Singleton) talked about being inspired by anime, and here’s anime taking it, putting some sauce on it and throwing it back. JP’s engine kicks so hard it seems to bend time and reality and stretch his car and flesh like taffy.

The enthusiasm for visual exaggeration, bodily contortion and bizarro technology remind me of Peter Chung’s Æon Flux, which is a huge compliment from me. All the strange hybrids of human, animal and machine made me think of Galaxy High, a Saturday morning cartoon I liked when I was a kid. I’m sure that wasn’t as good, but in my mind it was like this. Of course I thought about SPEED RACER, specifically the live action version, since it’s trying to push the limits of its medium (and of human eyeballs) so hard. I was also reminded of Death Race 2020, the comic book that for a while sequelized Paul Bartel’s movie with very cool art by Kevin O’Neil of The League of Extraordinary Gentlemen and Marshal Law fame.

One flamboyant touch that made me laugh out loud was the title sequence having a chorus actually sing the title and then an American-sounding voice excitedly announce, “Directed by Takeshi Koike!” The screenplay is by Katsuhito Ishii (writer/director of live action films like SHARK SKIN MAN AND PEACH HIP GIRL, PARTY 7, THE TASTE OF TEA and FUNKY FOREST), Yōji Enokido (Bungo Stray Dogs), and Yoshiki Sakurai (Ghost in the Shell: Stand Alone Complex).

I didn’t know (or at least remember) this going in, but the director came up under that other director whose work I’ve been enjoying, Yoshiaki Kawajiri, having been hired by Madhouse straight out of high school and working (first as an in-betweener) on Kawajiri joints including WICKED CITY, GOKU: MIDNIGHT EYE, NINJA SCROLL, and VAMPIRE HUNTER D: BLOODLUST. After more than a decade of that training Koike directed the crazy opening animation of PARTY 7 (2000), establishing himself as a wild stylist. I’ve seen a few more of his works after that: he did the excellent ANIMATRIX short “World Record,” and the pilot for Afro Samurai. REDLINE was his first feature, and so far his only original one (he’s followed it with five films in the LUPIN THE IIIrD series).

The potential for the medium of animation is limitless. There are a million amazing things it can do that REDLINE does not. But this movie is a standout because it slams the gas so hard on the form’s most primal element: drawings that move. It’s all about making crazy drawings and making them move crazy. Put that in a pellet and drop it in your engine.