An unabashed all-singing all-dancing American hotrod, Lightning is a car that curves in the right places and purrs in the right places.

On the highway jealous glances and unbridled hero worship is common while in races it always wins… and it has the bearing of a machine that deserves every ounce of success. If it’s possible for a car to have attitude then Lightning has it in abundance.

But wait. Waxing lyrical about the bhp, mpg, torque and top speed is not going to be any use, because Lightning has disappeared in disgrace. Maybe the good people at Pixar Animation Studios can explain to us why.

Cars (PG, previewed at Odeon Douglasfield) is Lightning’s story and a note to motor manufacturers for the future: If you want people to really find out about the inner workings of your machine, follow the Pixar route rather than a Haynes manual.

Cars is a visual 10-course feast, with a barbecue thrown in for good measure. Every frame is stunning in its execution. Lightning (voiced by Owen Wilson) exists in an eye-popping world of colour and noise, where the sole inhabitants are vehicles.

Rumours that Jeremy Clarkson is aiming to be the first human inhabitant could not be confirmed.

Our boy Lightning, decked out in his fancy Goodyear boots, is king of the ring, master of the oval racing circuit and bathed in arrogance at his success.

A wrong turn on the highway however, results in Lightning being stranded in the sleepy backwater of Radiator Springs, where he quickly falls foul of the locals and is left to stew in his own brake fluid, while his competitors are practicing for the race of a lifetime the next weekend.

It’s a million miles away from the glitz and glamour of the racing circuit where the nearest thing to himself is a rust-bucket tow truck called Mater (Larry the Cable Guy), which last had a service around the same time as the Reliant Robin was hailed as a triumph of innovation.

Throw in a VW camper van that lives in a hippy daze, a couple of Fiat Ferrari fanatics and livestock in the form of ageing tractors and it’s not hard to see why Lightning doesn’t seem to fit in.

In this very different environment, Lightning is forced to come to terms with his less dynamic new friends and although his superiority complex is initially to the fore, he soon comes to realise that adoration and success isn’t everything and sometimes a more sedate pace of life can be just as satisfying.

While perhaps not quite as laugh out loud hilarious as the Incredibles or Toy Story, Cars is still head and shoulders above nearly all the animation output of the non-Pixar studios.

The pace lags a bit in the middle, but fortunately boredom is averted with an inspiring finale, that neatly wraps up all the elements of the story. No-one will leave the cinema unhappy with how it turns out.

Cars has all the visual gags, knowing in-jokes and eye-popping set-pieces that we come to expect from the Rolls Royce of CGI spectaculars. If this was a road test, there aint no way the car would be returned.

VERDICT: Pixar is still firing on all cylinders.

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