Movie review: Cars 2 (3D) **

Stars: Owen Wilson, Michael Caine, Emily Mortimer and Larry the Cable Guy
Director: John Lasseter
Rated: G
Showing: Neptune Cinema week of Friday, July 8 – Friday 7pm, Saturday-Sunday 1:30pm/5pm, Monday-Thursday 6:30pm. For more information about film times, call 292-7296.
Tickets: Buy tickets online
Runtime: 113 minutes
Animation/children

The talking autos are cute, and the visual and verbal puns break all land-speed records.

Cars 2, the sporty sequel to the 2006 release, celebrates the little tow truck who could.

Mater (voice of Larry the Cable Guy), the buck-toothed, dented and rusty tow truck, leaves the sleepy town of Radiator Springs to be the pit-crew boss for his pal, Lightning McQueen (Owen Wilson). The cherry-red racecar is favoured to win an International Grand Prix that will take Mater and him to Tokyo, Paris and London.

Lightning’s sponsor is Allinol, an eco-friendly gas substitute developed by Sir Miles Axlerod (Eddie Izzard as the voice of a Land Rover), out to prove that clean fuel can win the race.

Unbeknownst to Lightning and Mater, British spies Finn McMissile (Michael Caine, voice of an Aston-Martin) and Holley Shiftwell (a snappy convertible with the voice of Emily Mortimer) are investigating the ownership of mid-Atlantic oil rigs that may have a sinister connection with the Grand Prix.

At the Tokyo meet, Holley mistakenly identifies the unworldly Mater as a brother spy, turbo-charging the plot.

While the plot may be too twisty for most kids (and adults) to follow, the art of Cars 2 is as imaginative as anything Pixar has ever done.

But what good are all these details and inside jokes when the filmmakers speed past them so quickly that viewers will have to wait for the freeze frame on their home-viewing system to catch them?