RACING AGAINST IRRELEVANCE: REDLINE AND THE VALUE OF THE VALUELESS

MAX ROTHMAN - Writer, 3rd Year, Philosophy and Biology

"I like muscle cars :)"

Redline is a movie about many things. It is about a man, a car, racing, love. Thosewho have seen it know it needs no introduction; nothing short of the viewingitself can really do so in a way that does it justice.

To give a brief synopsis to those who have not seen it: Redline is a very visuallyengaging movie set in the sci-fi future, concerning extreme pompadour-rockingdriver J.P., and his undertaking of the legendary “Redline” death race, the mostpopular event in the galaxy. It is wild, fast paced, and contains absurd vehicularaction and is stunningly animated. Every second of it feels practically alive, inmotion, and oft best described as visually insane and artistically inspired. I mustforewarn fairly - spoilers do lie ahead for the rest.

As much as Redline wastes very little within its short runtime on anything but theracing (and a bit on the romance), in the end, it is a film about the value withinobsolescence – a message that is as relevant in its futuristic alien setting as itis now, both within its focus and abroad.

lies in the very core rule (of the very few) that governs the actual race itself –entrants must be using vehicles powered by combustion engines. The mannerof propulsion and indeed whatever fuel or architecture of the engines seemseffectively ungoverned, from hover fans to legs to the classic wheels, but therule remains consistent and explicitly stated.

This would, to an uninitiated observer, seem either an odd or meaningless restrictionwhen taking to consideration that hovercrafts mounting homing rocketsand cannons are equally legal entrants as J.P.’s Trans Am 20000, a normalcar by comparison. Despite this, however, none of these vehicles are in any wayrelevant to the universe they operate within. For all their speed or weapons, theyare lesser than what is the standard of the time; anti-gravity powered vehicles.That power source seems the usual for all vehicles not seen participating in therace, from the mafioso’s large and luxurious observation vehicle to the chopper-esquemotorcycle J.P. makes use of before the big race. Furthermore, it’snoted by J.P. that they provide a ton of power, as the bike clearly gets out ofcontrol immediately even from his highly skilled hands.One must ask themselves – if this is the newest standard, and it wholly outclassesthe focal competition point in the race, then what is the point of bringingit up in the narrative? Why even add a detail like that, or take any time to mentionit (or simply make the cars run on the most advanced engine – it is a scifi setting, after all)? In a sense, it seems to devalue the racers’ rides if they’reportrayed as the best, yet outclassed and inherently obsolete no matter how advanced they are.

This fact itself though shows the film was produced by those truly passionate about classic cars and racing, and why it’s an absolute enduring favorite of yours truly. Long before I became an anime fan, I grew up with my father taking me to car shows and events. Going to events and seeing collections and appreciators of vehicles older than we were is heartening, awesome despite their oft lackluster modern performance or features. The pinnacle of many a classic car fan, no matter the era, is the annual Rolex Monterey Motorsport Reunion races, where people from all corners of the country and globe bring their very best of every era to participate and gather in era-staged races around a proper track. This itself can be from a moving museum to cars created less than two decades ago, and it never fails to excite me at attendance.

In some sense – by many a critic’s assessment – this event is inherently meaningless in its excitement value. None of the racecars at those events can hold to a modern F1 car, and almost all of them fail in terms of power, torque, fuel economy, and performance to today’s most cutting edge consumer electric vehicles. By all accounts, those interested in performance should be most excited by the Tesla smoking the 60’s sled in the dust, or at the very least more interested in the pursuit of that pinnacle than beating a half-century-dead horse. After all, what’s the point? Those vehicles are outdated, obsolete, unsafe, and no matter what will lose to the new paradigm of the era. Why do NASCAR stock cars use 5-speed manuals, when automatic race clutches shift faster than drivers can think? Really, outside a museum or maybe the aesthetic, why does anyone care?

The beauty and excitement of it, as Redline well exhibits and understands, isn’t about the death-race’s cars being the very best – it isn’t the point to make the most supremely overpowered vehicle. Rather, it revels in the creativity and the quirkiness of the obsolete; the lack of pinnacle capability forces room for user error in variables or deficits otherwise eliminated to computerized minimums by the most advanced technology of the era.

J.P.’s Trans Am 20000 using an oversized, custom-fit, highly temperamental engine block is made irrelevant next to the anti-gravity film chase craft that easily keep up with the racers, but the viewer’s eye isn’t drawn to the latter. The race has more excitement when things are left to chance and skill – in short, the human element. The same can be said of the modern-day car, rapidly falling behind its electric successor, or any other case of stylish obsolescence. The work of the past – and the extent to the work capable with those tools – is thus rendered meaning anew, pulled from its irrelevance to continued excitement. The human condition is such that we are romantics, no matter the setting or era, be it here and now or far flung into the future.

To that exact love, Redline is a soliloquy: to the pointlessly irrelevant, to the value of the valueless, to driving fast in something old.