2013 Movie Review: 'Turbo'

Associate Editor Blake Z. Rong: "Where were you when a snail entered the Indy 500?"

It's a simple premise, really. "Turbo" is the heartwarming story of a talking snail (Ryan Reynolds) who's obsessed with IndyCar racing, then after traveling to the 101 Freeway and falling into the LA River, he finds himself sucked into the engine of a supercharged Camaro. After being injected with nitrous oxide, he gains superpowers and is discovered by a rotund taco stand chef -- whose phony glasses bear him more than a passing resemblance to Russell from 2009's "Up" -- with a penchant for after-hours snail racing, where the eponymous Turbo meets a ragtag crew of "tricked-out" (press release phrasing, not ours) fellow racing snails led by Samuel L. Jackson. Then, they enter the snail into the Indianapolis 500, a premise less farfetched than Kevin Cogan's 1982 crash that took out AJ Foyt and Mario Andretti before the green flag even dropped.

Is there a montage to the 1992 House of Pain hip-hop classic "Jump Around"? Of course there is. Does Snoop Dogg say "Indy-dizzle-wizzy"? You're damn right he does. Does the CEO of IndyCar drive a Chevrolet Traverse? Only if GM says he does. Director David Soren treats this as a love letter to IndyCar (and Verizon product placement), and he loves it so much that he wants all his bestest friends in the world! to share his enthusiasm, if not his affinity for Judas Priest albums.

Enthusiastic it is: the racing scenes are sufficiently dramatic, the race cars themselves are rendered accurately, and the people themselves look creepy enough to make "The Croods" resemble Audrey Hepburn in "Roman Holiday." By the end of the movie, you'll root for Turbo in a way that will make up for all those times you had French Laundry's Fricass

By Blake Z. Rong- Mark Z. Vaughn