This film won the race in reverse

Rating: 5/10 (5 November 2006)

I watched it for one reason - Sacha Baron Cohen. I was hoping for Bruno-level campness - always good for a low brow laugh, and at least a passable attempt at a French accent, which really isn't that hard. I got neither - he was a complete flop in his role, and in fact his role was atrociously constructed, so perhaps it wasn't his fault.
However, what I got instead was a good back-to-basics snigger-fest at the foibles, and just plain trashiness of the American "culture" which surrounds NASCAR, and its ilk. OK, the stereotyped redneck is easy to parody, but this was done with a certain finesse which kept it fresh right till the absurd end. Of course it was very predictable in places, but had just enough comic twists to surprise occasionally. Many of the support apart from Baron Cohen had some very witty lines as Mr Bobby's foil, and they delivered them well.
The product placement was a tad annoying (well done Sony for that _huge_ Vaio logo). The spoof adverts in the film almost made up for all the real not-really-particularly-subliminal ones.
I expected little from the film - it gave me far more than I expected.