John Lasseter; Joe Ranft
Cars - Motori Ruggenti

THE REVIEW

How is it that a beautiful and intelligent film like "Cars" (despite being maligned by three mediocre sequels) never really found its place in the audience's heart, beyond the $461,983,149 earned worldwide? It's hard to say, but perhaps even more than "Toy Story", this is the film John Lasseter has always loved the most—the work he dreamed of making since 1998 while post-producing the equally successful "A Bug’s Life". The most coherent answer might be that, contrary to appearances, "Cars" is not a film for kids, let alone children; perhaps it’s for adults, but adults who are film buffs, given the impressive number of references and moods saturating the movie. The anthropomorphic cars are, in fact, just an excuse to talk about something else, against the backdrop of a rural America halfway between modernity and the Old West. And the extralarge running time of almost two hours certainly doesn’t help.

Technically, the film is flawless. The characterization of the "motorized" characters is incredible (though not on the level of "Monsters, Inc.", 2001): from the hero Lightning McQueen to all the supporting characters (the Chevrolet Chick Hicks; the 1970 Plymouth The King; the seemingly worn-out ex-champion Doc Hudson; the friendly tow truck Mater, who handles almost all the comic interludes). Naturally Lightning McQueen recalls Steve McQueen (famously a great car race enthusiast); Doc Hudson (a 1951 Hudson Hornet) has the appearance, and in the original version the voice, of Paul Newman (in his last official work, making the legendary Hudson even more melancholic); the Fiat 500 Luigi is a tribute to Italy and to Ferrari, which our Luigi is hopelessly in love with; the dull-witted tractors who don’t understand the importance of cars and car racing. Specifically, they don’t get why Lightning McQueen wants so desperately to win the prestigious Piston Cup in California, even though he’s stuck in Radiator Springs (a forgotten little town on rural Route 66), forced to reckon with the rhythms and lessons of American provincial life, and with the love of Sally Carrera, a car who’s also a lawyer.

The main criticism was the supposed weakness of the screenplay (written by as many as eleven writers), and in fact, the idea of a car stuck in a relatively confined space for almost an hour and a half is, if not risky, at least curious. Lasseter and Joe Ranft stake everything on the likability of the characters and "challenge" the audience to change perspective: not just an action and speed movie anymore (even though the opening and finale are at full throttle) but also a film where it's not a problem to stop, lose yourself in the dialogues, and smile at the many gags, all of which succeed (confirming the old, always valid rule that "the better the supporting characters work, the better the film is"). And the depiction of these arid, very Fordian USA is a stroke of genius: there are references to Howard Hawks’s "Line 7000"; Peter Bogdanovich’s "The Last Picture Show"; traces of Frank Capra, and that Rooseveltian optimism the director from Bisacquino always expressed in his countless masterpieces, here reinterpreted for our times, in a 2006 reminding us that all American cinema comes from the western and the great classics of the '30s and '40s.

The film is to be credited to both directors, but it is very much a "Lasseterian" work, as Lasseter dedicates the film to his friend Joe Ranft (co-director) who died at the end of filming. The Italian dubbing does some damage, but less than expected.

Characters and voice actors (original/Italian): Lightning McQueen (Owen Wilson/Massimiliano Manfredi); Doc Hudson (Paul Newman/Cesare Barbetti); Sally Carrera (Bonny Hunt/Sabrina Ferilli); Mater (Daniel Whitney/Marco Messeri); Ramon (Cheech Marin/Eugenio Marinelli); Luigi (Tony Shalhoub/Marco Della Noce [sic!]; Guido (Guido Quaroni/Alex Zanardi); Chick Hicks (Michael Keaton/Pino Insegno); The King (Richard Perry/Michele Kalamera); Clunk (Ray Migliozzi/Daniele Formica); Boost (Jonas Rivera/Giancarlo Fisichella); Jay Limo (Jay Leno/Simone Colombari); Mario Andretti (Mario Andretti/Luciano Turi); Ferrari (Michael Schumacher/idem); Woody automobile (Tom Hanks/Fabrizio Frizzi); Buzz Lightyear automobile (Tim Allen/Massimo Dapporto); Mike automobile (Billy Crystal/Tonino Accolla); Sully Camion (John Goodman/Adalberto Maria Merli).