Fast and Furious movie review from modmove

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Fast & Furious
Genesis 2:3 (and a half) And on the 8th day God created fast cars and Vin Diesel and, behold, it was very good. It was very good indeed!

Scholars and critics have subsequently wished that The Lord had skipped smoko, lunch and dinner in order to find time to create a decent accompanying scriptwriter but alas it was not to be. Perhaps He did it for the good of all mankind as fast cars plus Vin plus an excellent script would cause audiences heads to explode through sheer awesome overload. It would have been tempting to find out though.

After a couple of wayward entries in this seminal street racing franchise, Fast & Furious finally winds its way back to the roots of the original The Fast And The Furious (note the clever grammatical difference between the two titles) and naturally begs the question, why oh why were any of the sequels made without Vin's input? That the best part of Tokyo Drift was Vin's fleeting cameo in the final frame is testament to this.

It's a fine line that Fast And Furious traverses with its exhilarating albeit supremely infeasible action sequences but it is partly this outrageous impracticality that makes the film so much fun; you'll find yourself joyously laughing out loud at the proceedings rather than groaning in disbelief. The dialogue is quite awful at times… well, OK, most of the time… and the plot is likewise predictable but it's all about the cars, man! And I for one just can't get enough of this stuff. With its abundance of Torinos, GTOs, Skylines, Imprezas and Silvias (among others), Fast & Furious continues this franchise's rivalry of American muscle vs. Nippon pocket rockets with a small showing of European racing engineering (Beemers and Porsches) thrown in so as not to snub our continental friends. Aussies remain snubbed however; not a Phase III GTHO or Monaro in sight. Definite room for improvement there!

Exactly where the film sits in the chronology of this franchise is not made entirely clear but a throw away line referring to the Tokyo drag scene would suggest it sits somewhere between 2 Fast 2 Furious (more clever grammatical acrobatics) and Tokyo Drift. The films conclusion also segues nicely into Tokyo Drift so we can expect a direct Vin Diesel-starring sequel to that film sometime in the future.

Nobody expects sterling performances in a movie like this but make no mistake, when it comes to high octane, nitrous injected action, Vin Diesel is da man! Paul Walker remains the weak link in this duo but he's certainly adequate and possesses the requisite spunk required to keep his side of deal afloat. Besides, he's no more wooden than Keanu (a highly appropriate analogy given that the first film in this franchise is narratively identical to the Keanu-starring Point Break and likewise Vin is the charismatic equal of Patrick Swayze). Naturally the girls are sidelined in this macho machine-dominated world. Michelle Rodriguez (who is barely in it - probably a good thing) delivers her special brand of I'm-Vin-Diesel-with-tits sass and Jordana Brewster injects some requisite racy curves and glamour, but they're both adequate and well suited to their limited roles.

Fast cars and Vin Diesel - little else is needed really.
Stuart Jamieson
official website


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