Stars share thoughts on 'Racer'

LAS VEGAS — "Speed Racer" stars Emile Hirsch and Christina Ricci are better known for smaller independent movies than summer blockbusters.

Yet they could not pass up the chance to work with Larry and Andy Wachowski on the brothers' first writing-directing effort after "The Matrix" trilogy.

After the lesbian thriller "Bound" and their science-fiction franchise, all dark R-rated affairs, the Wachowskis have gone the family route with the PG-rated "Speed Racer," a live-action and computer-animated update of the TV cartoon series.

Hirsch, who starred last year in Sean Penn's acclaimed drama "Into the Wild," plays Speed, the young phenomenon of the Racer family, who gets behind the wheel to take on a corrupt corporate honcho ruining auto racing.

Ricci, most recently seen as a pig-faced girl in the fairy-tale romance "Penelope," plays Speed's girlfriend Trixie, who flies the skies in her helicopter to scout out the race course.

With the Wachowskis reteaming with "Matrix" producer Joel Silver, "Speed Racer" also stars John Goodman, Susan Sarandon, Matthew Fox, and a pet chimpanzee that's constantly getting into trouble.

Hirsch, 23, and Ricci, 28, chatted with The Associated Press at March's ShoWest theater-owners convention, where distributor Warner Bros. showed off footage of "Speed Racer."

AP: Given the more serious films the two of you often do, a big summer action movie doesn't seem like an obvious choice.

Ricci: But this is the coolest, because it's the Wachowski brothers, and also, it's not your average cheesy big blockbuster. It's really awesome.

Hirsch: There's something just so wonderfully rebellious about the idea of being like some serious actor and having to just do those kind of movies, where I wanted to spit on the idea and just do something so wrong. But it's so right.

Ricci: And so much about choices for me is about what's going to be fun. This sounded like so much fun. You get to go do an actiony film and a really stylized character. To me, that's fun.

AP: The racing sequences were created by computer animation. Was there any actual driving involved?