Slow race to old age
Lightning McQueen puts not-so-brave face on athlete in decline
There are lots of races in “Cars 3.” There are races in big stadiums, on dirt tracks, on simulators, and even through the woods with the headlights out. The races, almost too many to count, take up an enormous amount of screen time, so if you’re someone who can’t get enough of contests between animated automobiles, this movie is a dream come true.
For everyone else, this latest installment in the Pixar franchise is a disappointment. It’s essentially a drama about a midlife crisis. Our hero, Lightning McQueen — a red car voiced by Owen Wilson — was a naive up-andcomer in the original “Cars.” The new film is the inevita-
ble eventual sequel, the formula to go to when there are no other ideas. It’s the story of Lightning’s coping with decline, with the realization that there are other, faster cars entering the sport.
As in the other “Cars” movies, the cars are people, though it’s never exactly clear to what extent they are born whole, as fixed entities, and to what extent they have parts that can be replaced. In other words, where is the soul or the brain located? If Lightning McQueen wants to go faster than his new rival Jackson Storm (voice of Armie Hammer), couldn’t he just get a brand-new engine? Or would that be like a person getting a head replaced? We do know that the cars here can get body work and a paint job, but that might be the equivalent of a haircut. Or a face-lift.
But wait, aren’t we taking this all too seriously? Well, sure, but the movie invites it. Aside from the whimsicality of the cars-are-people setup, a setup we’re already used to from two previous films, “Cars 3” has nothing funny about it. Instead it invites us into the pain and self-questioning that comes to every great athlete when he realizes that he’s slipping.
So when we’re not seeing a red car chasing a blue car, “Cars 3” consists of lots of forlorn whining from Owen Wilson — one of the best forlorn whiners in the business — as Lightning swings from hope to doubt to despair over his career. This is the movie’s emotional hook, the thing the audience is supposed to invest in and worry about. But would it really be so terrible to retire? It’s a difficult adjustment that all athletes ultimately face, but it’s not the end of the world.
Director Brian Fee and a team of seven screenwriters (including himself ) attempt to intensify the rooting interest by making Lightning’s young rival arrogant and obnoxious. But even then, the notion of beating him hardly rises to the level of a moral quest. The filmmakers overestimate the audience’s investment in Lightning McQueen’s automotive supremacy.
Or perhaps they do realize it, because midway the movie starts focusing on the character of Lightning’s trainer, an enthusiastic young female car named Cruz (Cristela Alonzo). The movie’s pivotal conversation, in which Cruz reveals that she once hoped to be a racer but found that she lacked the nerve, is a standout piece of writing, a scene that could, with some obvious adjustments, work just as well with live actors.
“Cars 3” goes through lots of predictable paces, and for all the emphasis on speed, it takes a long time getting to where it’s going. However, Pixar’s production values alone make “Cars 3” intermittently entertaining, and the facial expressions of the cars are emotionally on target and uncanny in their evocation of human expression. That alone is a worthwhile achievement.
Would it really be so terrible to retire? It’s a difficult adjustment that all athletes ultimately face, but it’s not the end of the world.