Death Race - Set Visit Report

"Gentlemen: Start Your Engines." Is it wrong to find those words sexy? Should I be worried that I'm more excited to meet Frankenstein's Monster 2006 Ford Mustang GT than I am its driver, actor Jason Statham? Is there a psychiatric term for "gear head"? I like Statham's muscles just fine, but I like a muscle car even more. So being on the set of the remake of Death Race in Montreal last November really sparked my plugs.

Although I've been a fan of genre-icon producer Roger Corman's work for many years, I hadn't seen his classic futuristic gore-fest, Death Race 2000, before; so I watched it on the long plane ride from sunny So Cal to wintry East Canada. The 1975 classic, directed by Paul Bartel and starring David Carradine, Sylvester Stallone and Mary Woronov, had the tagline "In The Year 2000 Hit And Run Driving Is No Longer A Felony. It's The National Sport!" and played the violence up for satirical laughs. It was right in line with its futuristic and violent contemporaries, Rollerball and Logan's Run. It spawned many a worshipful homage, including Mad Max and its sequels, The Road Warrior and Beyond Thunderdome.

The new version of Death Race, dropping the 2000 tag and written and directed by Paul W.S. Anderson (Resident Evil, Alien Vs. Predator), will take on an entirely new tack. "It's a reimagining of the original," explained the filmmaker as stunt trucks and cars raced by in the distance. "It's not a straight remake, but it keeps a lot of the original concepts intact. The masked racer called Frankenstein (Statham), who appears to be indestructible, but is not who he appears to be underneath the disguise. Yeah, it's still got Machine Gun Joe (Tyrese Gibson). It's still a death race," but the camp-factor is removed, as is the setup. No longer a free will contest, this takes place in a prison and is set up by a sadistic warden (Joan Allen). Pitting prisoners against one another, "It's a race to the death where the drivers are allowed to kill one another and are even encouraged to do so."

Gone are the irritating reporters who do running commentary, and the cross-country aspect has been scrapped. "It's more contained than the original, which makes it a lot more intense," says Anderson. "So it's kind of more contained but then again, it's so much bigger than the original in that it's got — we've spent a lot more money on it." As it's explained, this death-race happens once a year, like the Super Bowl. It’s webcast from the prison, which is corporate-owned, not governmental.

So, it sounds like a straight-up action flick, with lots of vrooming violence. While I did love the original Death Race 2000 in all its sex- and ex-ploitation, I'm open so see what Anderson does with a grittier version. And speaking of gritty, this set is the real deal through and through. We're in what's known in their cineverse as Damnation Alley.

The location scouts used Google maps to find this place. It's quite bleak and desolate. Industrial, muddy and rusty. I walk through the racetrack area, and the wildly jagged ground feels sharp even under well-protected feet. I can only imagine what it does the tires. I'm told stunt drivers zoom through the buildings and these narrow tracks at about 65 mph, and they don't even slow down for the dark tunnel, which leads to Damnation Alley. Strategically placed crumpled cars litter the sides of the track. Suddenly, a tanker truck, heavily armored and armed to its bolted nines, roars by shooting blanks. It's loud, it's huge. It's The Dreadnaught.

Next up, we're treated to tour of the mechanic's garage. It's a hemi-heaven of Hero, Stunt, and Pyro cars. I see several Mustangs, all modified in one way or another, plus Machine Gun Joe's 2004 Dodge Ram 1500 4wd, complete with a realistic-looking Ram's skull and horns affixed to the front grille with wire and duct tape. It's not high-tech, it's wreck-tech.

The people get wrecked, too. Max Ryan, the actor who's playing Statham's nemesis in the movie, is doing a fight scene today, and he's covered in fake blood and muck. "I have a fight with Jensen, also known as Frankenstein, Jason's character," he explains between takes. "We're in the garage and I kind of trick him into... I kind of walk past his bay, and he's having a conversation with one of his guys when I walk by. He walks out and I coax him into my garage, and as he comes in, I have three guys with me, which is kind of handy.  They club him on the back and he just goes off.  It gets really nasty and one of his guys comes in and helps him. He manages to get free, takes out two of my guys and then we have another brawl. So I get quite a lot of bruises from that as well."

Statham, definitely muscular (he worked out with the same trainers who ripped the dudes in 300, we're told), but as always jocular, he laughs throatily when I ask where the little English cars are (referencing The Italian Job, of course). "Better than the Mini Coopers, these are. Talk about little Minis; don't go very fast. These have a bit more of the engine inside, more toys to play with." He's not kidding. Frankenstein's flat black Mustang GT is a supercharged 4.6L V8, with a Ford Racing Exhaust System and it's beyond cool. I even got to have my picture taken with it! That is one sweet ride.

Sorry. Statham is still talking. He's revealing that Frankenstein has been wrongly convicted and he's "in prison trying to clear his name, the best way he can. No one is interested in listening to that story. So the only way he can find a way to exit that hellhole is to win five races, and so he takes on the persona of Frankenstein, which is a creation that the evil Warden Hennessy has brought to everyone's attention through the masses of the Internet. He has to take the place of Frankenstein because the real Frankenstein is dead."

Whether you like cars, Statham or racing, I know you like blood or you wouldn't be here at a site called horror.com. So of course, I ask about the gore-quotient. Anderson smiles and promises, "It's bloody. I mean, people get pretty mangled in the film. It's an R-rated, gruesome movie. I mean, it's not Hellraiser in the sense of, like, buckets of blood... But it's a very violent film."

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Staci Layne Wilson reporting