[tburmeister]

Cython is another Python-like language that gets compiled to C; it's a great tool for getting big performance bumps for very little effort.

[chestervonwinch]

In my experience, by the time I start getting performance improvements with Cython (typing everything, removing Python function calls, etc.), I seem to end up with code that's bigger and messier than if I had just written a C extension or used f2py.