Need for Speed Movie Revs Up Its Publicity Engine

Video game to movie adaptations usually don’t go that well. I think I’m still psychologically scarred from seeing Hollywood’s version of Super Mario Bros. as a child. But movies with bitching car chase and racing scenes usually kick ass. So I’m torn about Need For Speed.

This new video from the movie’s official YouTube page at least shows star Aaron Paul and the rest of the cast have the right level of enthusiasm for cars and racing. And we get a few glimpses of some of the car scenes.

Tflcar.com also has an article by Nicole Wakelin about a pre-screening and a Q&A with Paul that was held Feb. 12. Though it’s not a full review, you get the impression from the article that the movie will at least appeal to gear heads  with all of the vehicular eye candy on display, including a special Ford Mustang designed just for Paul’s vengeance-seeking character,

“The Ford Mustang is featured heavily as the car driven by hero Tobey Marshall (Aaron Paul) and it is a glorious sight to behold. It was designed specially for the film and is based on the 2013 Shelby GT500. Carol Shelby passed away while he was working on the 50th Anniversary Mustang, so Ford aimed to create something they hoped would be true to his vision, like the signature blue stripes and chrome. The Need for Speed Mustang includes a wider body, 20″ alloy wheels for performing stunts, and a V8 that’ll take it up to 190 MPH,” writes Wakelin.

Though it sounds like people at the Q&A were much more interested in asking Paul about his role as Jesse Pinkman on Breaking Bad, Wakelin writes that he did get in an anecdote about one of the stunts in the new movie, a slide toward a camera in a Koenigsegg Agera R that Paul nervously managed to do “without killing anyone.”

Need for Speed opens in theaters March 14.