Even though Speed Zone is only known as Cannonball Run 3 in certain areas overseas there's no doubt in my mind this is a spiritual successor to those flicks simply due to the fact it's produced by the same person (Albert S. Ruddy), brings in Jamie Farr briefly to play a Sheik character, amasses a large cast of well-known actors/celebrities, and even kicks off with a chase scene where a bright red Lamborghini evades the police that ends with it skipping across the same lake where a youngster is learning how to skip rocks from his Grandfather. There's very little in the way of plot here, and only a few chuckles, but at least this isn't the bloated vanity project the second Cannonball flick turned out to be.

Plot-wise you can sum everything up in a mere sentence: When the yearly race from New York to Los Angeles gets interrupted by police chief Edsel (Peter Boyle), who gets all the drivers arrested, the car owners scramble to get replacements leading to various misfits being put behind the wheel to try and win the Cannonball. What follows is 90 minutes of mild comedy, a few expensive cars to ogle (if you're into that sort of stuff), and all-around mediocrity.

Amongst said mediocrity we get John Candy as a daydreaming parking attendant who is hired to win the race with Marilyn Monroe emulating sexpot Tiffany (Donna Dixon) in tow, Shari Belafonte and Melody Anderson as the smart girls who use their sex appeal to their advantage, former variety show stars The Smothers Brothers as two rich siblings who want to cheat by flying to the finish line, stereotyped mobsters played by Matt Frewer and Joe Flaherty , and a former cop turned reckless racer (Art Hindle). They all sort of drift in an out of the movie with some of the familiar faces having only the briefest of cameos. Hell, even the car chases which were one of the main draws of the original Cannonball Run are poorly handled making it so that, by the time they pull up on the pier in California, you won't care.

Considering that director Jim Drake directed many episodes of some beloved sitcoms like "Mary Hartman", "The Facts of Life", and "The Golden Girls" and that the cast is stacked with comedic talent you'd think that Speed Zone would be able to deliver the funny. It doesn't. The only scene that got any sort of chuckle from me was the one with Brooke Shields (playing herself) as an actress turned bitchy flight attendant. Apart from that it's all wasted potential but when I considered that Drake's only actual feature film before this was the fourth Police Academy movie it became less hard to believe.

The Canadian content of the cast is high here with no less than three former "SCTV" cast members appearing (Candy, Flaherty, and Eugene Levy) as well as Frewer, Hindle, Anderson, and familiar character actor Don Lake. They've also peppered in sitcom faces like Alyssa Milano and athletes like Carl Lewis so that, even if you're busy groaning at the lame jokes, you at least can occupy yourself trying to pick out all the names. I myself was much too busy staring at Dixon who steals the show not only in sex appeal but performance wise with her spot on imitation of Monroe even at one point saying she wants to change her name to "Norma Jean".

If it wasn't for the fact that, much like my unexplainable love for ski based comedy (I'll blame Hot Dog... The Movie - for giving me Shannon Tweed naked back when she wasn't a plastic surgery poster child), I'm a sucker for car race comedies I wouldn't have bothered with Speed Zone. It's a lazy, mostly laughless, attempt at recapturing the spirit of Cannonball Run but without the charm. (Chris Hartley, 3/16/11)

Directed By: Jim Draker.
Written By: Michael Short.

Starring: Melody Anderson, Peter Boyle, Donna Dixon, John Candy.