I may be missing something, but it did make me question whether or not it was a feature or not. Using Mario’s camera seems to just be the safer bet all around. It seems to ask the question “what does the player need to see” and proceeds to provide the exact opposite by drifting in various directions while you are moving.
The first thing I noticed when sitting down to give Super Mario 74 Extreme Edition a try was that the game’s Lakitu camera is a real pain.