Like the 1975 cult fave it's based on, the revamped Death Race is an unabashed B-movie. (How could it be anything else with Roger Corman as a producer?) Yet unlike its predecessor -- the scrappy, indie satire Death Race 2000, which was as amusing as it was exhilarating -- this action-and-pec-packed adrenaline rush is really just a video game masquerading as a movie. (And it's going to make one seriously kick-ass video game!) It also borrows liberally from other, better films, especially Escape From New York, The Shawshank Redemption and The Running Man. In fact, in many ways, writer-director Paul W. S. Anderson's flick seems more like a remake of the Stephen King-Schwarzenegger actioner than Paul Bartel's campy classic.

The initial setup mirrors the 1975 film: In the not-so-distant future, the economy collapses, a fascist government emerges and the unwashed masses crave the escape and excitement of gladiatorial combat. And so the Death Race is born. But unlike the original, which featured a cross-country competition in which anyone, including spectators, could end up slaughtered, this time around the contestants are inmates in a maximum security prison competing for their freedom.

This change takes all the bite out of the premise. There's a classic scene in the original, in which nurses push wheelchair-bound patients onto the track for the racers to kill -- old people are worth more points, you see. It's dark and it's awful and it's funny, and it makes the viewers as culpable as the drivers. In the remake, the event is televised as an overpriced pay-per-view, so we never see the common man getting off on the gore.

Our hero is former racer Jensen Ames (Jason Statham), a hardened criminal turned honest working family man who has been framed for murdering his wife. The tough-as-ice pick warden Hennessey -- three-time Oscar nominee Joan Allen, channeling Hillary Clinton -- makes the incarcerated Ames an offer he can't refuse: Win one race, and win his freedom. Of course there's a catch: He'll have to don the mask of Frankenstein, the prison's legendary driver and ratings draw, who secretly died while crossing his last finish line.

Ames is given a comedy relief pit crew -- stuttering geek Frederick Koehler, wisecracking Jacob Vargas and Deadwood's Ian McShane, who makes the most of his clunky one-liners. Tyrese Gibson plays the racetrack nemesis, but Hennessey is the real villain. She's every evil rolled into one: A lying politician, a greedy corporate sleazebag and a sadistic, cold-hearted bitch. Too bad her inevitable demise is decidedly anticlimactic.

All this said, Death Race does deliver some dumb thrills. Ladies (and a couple of men) actually applauded when a shirtless Statham did push-ups in his cell, and the female navigators, especially the comely Natalie Martinez, are also high-calorie eye candy. And then there's the action which, though often incoherent, will raise your heart rate. So it's really about expectations. In the mood to cheer at a graphic decapitation shown from three different angles? Go buy a ticket. Looking for something more subtle? Get back into your car and drive away... fast.