The Fast and the Furious (2016)

Just perfect...

I really wanted to like this movie. I feel terribly cynical trashing it, and that's why I'm giving it a middling 5. Actually, I'm giving it a 5 because there were some superb performances.

The film never slows down or bores, plunging from one harrowing sequence to the next.

This is one of the best movies I’ve seen in a very long time. You have to go and see this on the big screen.

It's impressing how much impact has this movie done in people. It is NOT so great as I've been told. 4 out of 10 is the fairest score i can think of.

The surprisingly humble beginnings (by comparison) of what is now a six film series, The Fast and the Furious was a hit for bringing a new lease of life to the racing film.An undercover cop, Brian O'Conner, must discover who is to blame for goods trucks being hi-jacked and stolen by drivers in high performance street cars. He puts himself into the urban culture of street racing where he meets Dominic Toretto and his team. Brian falls for Dominic's sister, Mia, in the process and threatens his investigation and his life.The film is quite a brainless piece of entertainment, its story is predictable, it follows an undercover cop who starts to sympathize with his targets, and the characters are written spontaneously to fit the demands of the plot. You gotta love the opening dialogue: "I like the tuna here," "Nobody likes the tuna here!" Plus, Paul Walker really is a bland actor.But, that isn't why we watch the film. The Fast and the Furious does have some great car racing scenes and director Rob Cohen can shoot the cars and make them look great. What is most appealing is the physicality of the stunts and the racing; there's no CGI tomfoolery here, and there is a simplicity about the film that makes it worth watching. You don't need to suspend your disbelief, the plot doesn't shovel many excuses for racing into your face.It is a neat, nitrous oxide powered glamour film. It doesn't say much, and it will probably age badly over time (and get a remake) but it is a must for every petrol-head and car racing fan out there.

The interesting thing about the long-running "Fast and Furious" franchise is that series fans seem to fall into one of two camps. Those who feel that the series started off decent but has gotten progressively better with each passing sequel. Especially as they take themselves less seriously and simply aim to entertain their audience more and more with increasingly insane and physics-defying action. And those who far prefer the earlier and slightly tamer installments for their slightly more grounded realism. And they tend to lament the fact that the later sequels have gone in an increasingly unrealistic and over- the-top direction. And as a result, I feel I must warn certain audience members... I'm most certainly in the former of those two groupings. Yes, I am somewhat sorry to say that to me, the franchise as a whole really didn't start picking up steam until about the third or fourth chapter. While by no means terrible, the earlier films haven't aged particularly well at all, and feel quite... docile and bland. Even the subject of this review- the original 2001 release from director Rob Cohen. It's a standard story and spends so much time on a plot ripped straight from "Point Break" (only substituting cars instead of surf-boards), that it doesn't really entertain to the same wild extent that later installments eventually reached.The film follows detective Brian O'Connor (the late Paul Walker), as he goes undercover to infiltrate the underground world of illegal street racing in Los Angeles. O'Connor and his superiors suspect that the same men and women who hold these illegal events are also responsible for a string of crimes throughout the city. He eventually forms a sort-of friendship with Dominic Toretto (Vin Diesel), one of the most famed of the underground racers. O'Connors conflicted feelings about whether or not to bust him are further complicated when he starts to fall for Dominic's younger sister Mia (Jordana Brewster), and eventually his investigation will lead to a complex and wild finale through the streets of LA.The highlights here are the wonderful and at-the-time relatively unknown cast and the high-octane action that crops up here and there. This is the film that really put Vin Diesel and the others on the map. Everyone gives it their all, and everyone comes across very likable and endlessly cool in the film. Especially Diesel and Walker, who both shot to stardom in the months following the film's release. I also really liked Michelle Rodriguez, who plays a supporting role as Letty, Domonic's girlfriend. She has that tough- yet-sexy appeal and works really well in the film. Brewster and fellow co-stars like Rick Yune and Chad Lindberg similarly do admirable jobs. On the whole, just a great, fun cast.Director Rob Cohen, fresh off of a string of 90's hits including "Dragonheart" and "Dragon: The Bruce Lee Story", does a phenomenal job handling the action and adventure with his kinetic camera-work and unique use of color and saturation. Say what you will about the mixed quality of the films he's made- the man can make a thrilling sequence. You really feel the speed in the races and each crash hits you right in the gut. This is amongst his best work as a visual storyteller, and he delivers the action full-throttle. When the film goes into full- blown carnage, it works marvelously.Unfortunately, the film falters quite a bit thanks to the aforementioned stock-screen writing and for being a bit too dated when viewed in comparison to the rest of the series. For all intents and purposes, there's not a lot going on "under the hood" here. Every twist and turn is telegraphed from a mile away, characters fall into broad and undeveloped clichés (usually given a single "quirk" to define them, which is lazy screen writing 101), and you'll know how it ends pretty much immediately. It takes away a lot of the experience. The fact that the film is also basically a photocopy of the superior "Point Break" is also distracting at times and can occasionally lead to a lot of unintended giggles. In addition, this film feels very much a product of its time. This has "Extreme 2001 movie!" written all over it. From the music to the editing to even the slang used in conversation... the film is dated to the point it even occasionally feels a bit cringe- worthy.Still, I don't think it's a bad movie. Just a troubled one. And I do think it is still most certainly worth seeking out, especially as a prerequisite to viewing the entire series. It sets up a lot of characters and context that are expanded on in later films, and there's a lot of fun to be had with the great performances and top-notch action. For my money... It's one of the weaker "Fast & Furious" films. But it's still a "Fast & Furious" film through-and-through. And I say give it a shot.I give it an about-average 6 out of 10.

"The Fast and The Furious" was the "Point Break" of the 2000s — a cop goes undercover to bust up a group of criminals who are into a specific "sport," but he becomes attached to the very people he's trying to bust. "Point Break" is the better film, but "The Fast and the Furious" was the start of a multi-billion-dollar franchise. Go figure.Paul Walker plays the cop, Brian O'Conner, but the screenplay doesn't reveal this card until Brian has not only won the respect of top street racer Dominic Toretto (Vin Diesel), but also the viewer. This small betrayal of our trust is writer Gary Scott Thompson's shrewdest move as the film goes from somewhat interesting, albeit cliché, to more interesting, albeit cliché.The screenplay — co-written with Erik Bergquist and David Ayer ("Training Day") based on the "VIBE" magazine article by Ken Li — is not the focal point of the movie, of course. This was 2001, the peak of the MTV Spring Break era. The point was to show hot foreign cars, hot foreign (and American) women and a lot of burning rubber. The rock, rap and techno music of the time feature prominently, and even rapper Ja Rule had a supporting role as a racer, a reminder of how the start of the 21st century was also the beginning of the music business starting to infiltrate the movie business.All this to say, director Rob Cohen understands this is a style over substance situation. Quarter-mile races, chases, fist fights and criminal heist activity are the featured attractions — as are the beautiful cars and beautiful people. If this film can be given any credit for originality, it belongs to the merging of heist/crime movie and drag race aesthetics. Cars had of course been featured in movies and television before, but this movie more authentically plays to the car aficionado, as a handful of films did in this era (e.g. "Gone in 60 Seconds," "The Italian Job"). There's a certain grittiness that this film has featuring real street-racing cars compared to James Bond, for example, driving something too cool to believe.The movie isn't 100 percent shallow from start to finish, however. A genuine effort is made to build chemistry between Walker and Diesel's characters. The story works best when it builds and tests that relationship. Nothing else about the movie feels worth our investment, but somehow we desperately do not want Brian and Dom to turn on each other despite all the reasons they should. Both Walker and Diesel bring likable dimensions to their characters and their chemistry is likely to be the bedrock of future films. (This coming from someone who has yet to see any of the other films yet.)The supporting cast, however, doesn't offer much. Dom's girlfriend, Letty (Michelle Rodriguez), brings nothing to the story, and the other guys in Dom's gang aren't given the chance to be anything but meatheads. The romance between Brian and Dom's sister Mia (Jordana Brewster) exists for formulaic reasons, but the fact that both of them feel kind of like outsiders to the street-racing culture gives their relationships some legitimacy.But enough about characters. "The Fast and the Furious" delivers some solid action sequences, especially the ones involving street cars and semi trucks. The racing scenes don't allow for much dimension, and the editing is decent to optimize suspense, but the CGI and green screen elements pull us out of what should feel like a very realistic, gritty street race. There are enough quality moments for action fans in "The Fast and the Furious" to overcome the MTV Spring Break music video world its characters inhabit. The 2000s were full of glossy movies with inferior story lines, and while comparing "The Fast and the Furious" to these films would obviously make it seem like a great movie when in fact it's an average one, it could be a suitable enough ambassador of its time and culture to movie watchers of the future.~Steven CThanks for reading! Visit Movie Muse Reviews for more