Sign in to follow this  
Nappi

The Fast and the Furious series

Recommended Posts

Confession: I had not watched a Fast and Furious movie until a couple weeks ago. I was under the impression that they were a steaming pile of soulless action garbage, like the Transformer series.
Subconfession: I have not watched a Transformers movie either, rendering the previous sentence completely irrelevant.

Anyway, I fired up the first movie some time ago, then proceeded to watch the other six. I was positively surprised to find warm, goofy action movies with clever casting. Spoilery impressions of each movie below:

The Fast and The Furious: I liked the friends and family focus of the movie. I also appreciated that, despite the premise, the main characters being suspicious of each other did not dictate the course and tone of the whole movie. The film was surprisingly "down to earth". For example, I loved that one of the most emotional scenes was a side character losing his father's car in a race.
2 Fast 2 Furious: I have practically no recollection about the plot of the movie. Something about drugs? Also, where is Vin Diesel? Totally forgettable.
Fast & Furious: The plot is still not very memorable, but at least Vin Diesel is back.
Fast 5: Oh my god, this is one of the best heist movies I have ever seen. Like Ocean's Eleven with cars, where the director doesn't pretend that George Clooney, Brad Pitt, and Matt Damon are not the same character. Amazing cast, great tone, whacky action. And those ridiculous Vin Diesel and The Rock moments... ugh. I hope they keep it up!
Fast & Furious 6: Nope, they've done fucked up. The cast and action is still great, but this movie has borrowed too many elements that I absolutely despise from modern action movies: A deeply sadistic antagonist; a previously empowered female character being downgraded to a target, victim, and motivation for the male leads; the killing of side characters just to give other characters a darker backstory; and the "just kidding, world is still shit" ending. I hope Furious 7 corrects the course. Meanwhile, it is time for...
The Fast and The Furious: Tokyo Drift: A fun movie. Unfortunately, the casting did nothing for me with the notable exception of Sung Kang. I was glad that Tokyo Drift was not as dark as Fast & Furious 6 despite the shared ending. However, this movie makes me even more angry about Fast & Furious 6, as it shows that Gal Gadot's character was killed off (without a funeral or anything, by the way) just because Sung Kang's character didn't have a woman in Tokyo Drift, and that Sung Kang's death was clearly not caused by a sadistic Jason Statham.
Furious 7: Oh wow... They dropped the ball even more spectacularly in terms of tone as compared to Fast & Furious 6. Jason Statham plays a good baddie, but it just doesn't fit this series (or more precisely, my ideal for this series). He is sadistic to the point of being ridiculous: In the first scene he visits his comatose brother, swears revenge, threatens to kill the hospital staff if anything happens to his brother, and then pretty much blows up the hospital. What the fuck? Also, yes, eye in the sky surveillance, and attack helicopters and drones is just what this goofy car movie needs...

And 8: I have zero reasons to go see this. The relationship between Vin Diesel and Paul Walker was one of the best parts of the whole series, and Walker's goofy smile whenever he realized he was surrounded by friends was genuinely uplifting. With Walker dead, and some of the more interesting side characters gone, and with the series seemingly committed to ramping up the tension, darkness, and brutality, I see no way for the next movie being interesting to me.

Anyway, I don't regret watching the whole series. It was worth it for The Fast and The Furious and Fast Five alone.

Share this post


Link to post
Share on other sites

Confession: I had not watched a Fast and Furious movie until a couple weeks ago. I was under the impression that they were a steaming pile of soulless action garbage, like the Transformer series.

Subconfession: I have not watched a Transformers movie either, rendering the previous sentence completely irrelevant.

Anyway, I fired up the first movie some time ago, then proceeded to watch the other six. 

 

 

I did more or less the same thing last year and had a very enjoyable marathon. I think I enjoyed 2, 6 and 7 more than you (in that I thought they were fine) but otherwise agree with everything in your assessments. 

Share this post


Link to post
Share on other sites

To be fair, 6 and 7 were still quite enjoyable action movies. I was just bummed about the drastic change in tone compared to 5. The second one completely failed to hold my attention, but in hindsight, it might not have been entirely the movie's fault.

Share this post


Link to post
Share on other sites

Fast and Furious 3, 4, and 5 are way better than they have any right to be, but that's because Justin Lin is actually pretty good in a silly space. I loved the Vulgar Auteur articles that came out around 5. 1 is good as well. 

 

Also, my annual Nerd-a-thon (its 24th year) is two weeks, and I'm open to any recommendations of films I may not have seen that might delight, or repulse my pals. Last year I brought Hard to Be a God, Neil Breen's Fateful Findings, Korkusu aka Turkish Rambo.

 

I'm looking particularly for any over the top violence of the kung fu/hong kong pistol opera kind, not the sadistic gore kind, unless it's a particularly nuts Tokyo Shock thing. The only thing I've got on that front is Killzone 2, which looks like the latest in a long line of Raid-a-likes.  

Share this post


Link to post
Share on other sites

Confession: I had not watched a Fast and Furious movie until a couple weeks ago. I was under the impression that they were a steaming pile of soulless action garbage, like the Transformer series.

Subconfession: I have not watched a Transformers movie either, rendering the previous sentence completely irrelevant.

Anyway, I fired up the first movie some time ago, then proceeded to watch the other six. I was positively surprised to find warm, goofy action movies with clever casting. Spoilery impressions of each movie below:

The Fast and The Furious: I liked the friends and family focus of the movie. I also appreciated that, despite the premise, the main characters being suspicious of each other did not dictate the course and tone of the whole movie. The film was surprisingly "down to earth". For example, I loved that one of the most emotional scenes was a side character losing his father's car in a race.

2 Fast 2 Furious: I have practically no recollection about the plot of the movie. Something about drugs? Also, where is Vin Diesel? Totally forgettable.

Fast & Furious: The plot is still not very memorable, but at least Vin Diesel is back.

Fast 5: Oh my god, this is one of the best heist movies I have ever seen. Like Ocean's Eleven with cars, where the director doesn't pretend that George Clooney, Brad Pitt, and Matt Damon are not the same character. Amazing cast, great tone, whacky action. And those ridiculous Vin Diesel and The Rock moments... ugh. I hope they keep it up!

Fast & Furious 6: Nope, they've done fucked up. The cast and action is still great, but this movie has borrowed too many elements that I absolutely despise from modern action movies: A deeply sadistic antagonist; a previously empowered female character being downgraded to a target, victim, and motivation for the male leads; the killing of side characters just to give other characters a darker backstory; and the "just kidding, world is still shit" ending. I hope Furious 7 corrects the course. Meanwhile, it is time for...

The Fast and The Furious: Tokyo Drift: A fun movie. Unfortunately, the casting did nothing for me with the notable exception of Sung Kang. I was glad that Tokyo Drift was not as dark as Fast & Furious 6 despite the shared ending. However, this movie makes me even more angry about Fast & Furious 6, as it shows that Gal Gadot's character was killed off (without a funeral or anything, by the way) just because Sung Kang's character didn't have a woman in Tokyo Drift, and that Sung Kang's death was clearly not caused by a sadistic Jason Statham.

Furious 7: Oh wow... They dropped the ball even more spectacularly in terms of tone as compared to Fast & Furious 6. Jason Statham plays a good baddie, but it just doesn't fit this series (or more precisely, my ideal for this series). He is sadistic to the point of being ridiculous: In the first scene he visits his comatose brother, swears revenge, threatens to kill the hospital staff if anything happens to his brother, and then pretty much blows up the hospital. What the fuck? Also, yes, eye in the sky surveillance, and attack helicopters and drones is just what this goofy car movie needs...

And 8: I have zero reasons to go see this. The relationship between Vin Diesel and Paul Walker was one of the best parts of the whole series, and Walker's goofy smile whenever he realized he was surrounded by friends was genuinely uplifting. With Walker dead, and some of the more interesting side characters gone, and with the series seemingly committed to ramping up the tension, darkness, and brutality, I see no way for the next movie being interesting to me.

Anyway, I don't regret watching the whole series. It was worth it for The Fast and The Furious and Fast Five alone.

 

I appreciate that you decided to watch the films in the cinematic canon chronology but I think you did yourself a disservice in some ways because the weird double take I did when Sung Kang came back and I was really confused and then when he kept showing up in films, but kind of excited by how stupid the series was getting. Finally there was the sad realisation that Gal Gadot wasn't going to make it (and neither was Sung Kang) and that means that every close call that Gal Gadot's character has is meaningful because you are going 'oh shit, is this when they kill her off?'

 

Also, Justin Lin didn't want to make more Furious films after Tokyo Drift and so he made the ridiculous demand that Sung Kang be brought back to life thinking they wouldn't do it, before he would agree to a three film deal. They did and that is why the fourth film is kind of flat but ridiculous (the Mexico border races are pure nonsense).

 

2 Fast 2 Furious is utterly dire, I struggle to go through it but it is kind of worth it for the dumb Cole Hauser presence and the introduction of Tyrese Gibson's character and Ludacris.

 

I personally like 5,6 and 7 the best. 5 is the best for sure, but 7 is close second, made better when you realise what an editorial nightmare it was. They were filming 7 & 8 back to back and then Paul Walker died so they had to fuse the two plots together to get enough footage. This is why there are like 3 different villains and two of them (Tony Jaa and Djimon Hounsou) get little air time and written out rather hastily. Also 7 is just so damn goofy, the scene when The Rock fixes his broken arm, classic stupid. The only downside is the random bits of misogyny they decide to throw in.

I started off watching Fast and Furious films for the sake of watching a series of films and getting drunk for fun, but I have grown to love the 'family' sentiment and it helped that everyone actually seemed to be having fun on set. I am sad to see that there has been some falling out on the set of 8, but they have got Kurt Russel back and Helen Mirren is in it, for reasons.

Share this post


Link to post
Share on other sites

Watching the end of F&F 5 having seen Tokyo drift first made the scene with Han and Gisele in the car to Berlin when he says he will go back to Tokyo someday a surprisingly emotional moment as was the death of Dom's friend. Up till that movie I didn't think much of the series but after reading some reviews I ended up watching it 3 times in 2 weeks.

Those movies really do commit to the theme of family in a way that is sometimes mawkish but mostly well done. From 5 onwards they have a really solid ensemble cast of people who are easy to like/ root for assembled from the previous 4.

 

The ending to 7/ Paul Walker send off was so good in a blurring of the lines between fiction and reality you only really see in professional wrestling. Talking about wrestling it is likely that the fall out between Vin Diesel and The Rock is a work for Wrestlemania which as a someone who watches wrestling was the first thing I thought when I heard it.

 

The history of this series is so unplanned and odd for one of biggest movies franchise of the last 15 years especially with most of them being rehashes/adaptions of existing works with 10 year plans.

 

 

 

One last thing about those movies is they have a consisently good to great soundtrack with 5 for me being the high point with this song.

 

 

PS - This opening montage to 6 was such a nice moment/ send off by Lin.

 

Share this post


Link to post
Share on other sites

Watching the end of F&F 5 having seen Tokyo drift first made the scene with Han and Gisele in the car to Berlin when he says he will go back to Tokyo someday a surprisingly emotional moment as was the death of Dom's friend.

 

Talking about wrestling it is likely that the fall out between Vin Diesel and The Rock is a work for Wrestlemania which as a someone who watches wrestling was the first thing I thought when I heard it.

 

The history of this series is so unplanned and odd for one of biggest movies franchise of the last 15 years especially with most of them being rehashes/adaptions of existing works with 10 year plans.

 

Yeah, I totally agree that knowing what is going to Sung Kang's character adds rather than detracts.

 

I know I shouldn't be getting annoyed by this because it is Fast and Furious and the series is inherently dumb. I am both relieved and rolling my eyes that this spat might be tied into Wrestling. I really hate wrestling.

Share this post


Link to post
Share on other sites

Reposted from the general movie topic:

 

I remember there was a Fast & Furious discussion here a while back, that seemed to praise the series. And years back I recall having a Good Time in the cinema with Fast Five. So it was disappointing when I saw Furious 7 (or whatever it's called) yesterday on Netflix and it was the most boring thing in existence. It begins with thirty minutes of depressed characters slowly looking at each other and brooding on things that happened earlier (of which I as a relative newcomer know nothing), then there were some fun but long action scenes (notably jumping with an expensive car through three buildings), and a loooong finale. There was nothing to it. Ironically, only the very ending managed to suddenly have enormous weight and substance, but a cast member literally had to die to get there. And it was a heartfelt moment, to be sure. The rest was such a drag, though.

Share this post


Link to post
Share on other sites

Bummer you didn't like it, but I can totally see why. There is something to watching the entire series and getting the build up of characters.

 

If even the action sequences didn't get to you then, yeah, that is fair. For me they were pretty inventive (the fight between Paul Walker and Tony Jaa in a van sliding off the side of a cliff is a good example).

 

F8 and the Furious is the dumbest name. I am so excited.

Share this post


Link to post
Share on other sites

I've been re-watching these over the last month with some friends who haven't seen them, but we haven't gotten to 7 yet.

 

 

My second viewing of these movies really re-enforces how much better the 5th movie is than all the others. It's really a gem, buried in the middle of an average-to-mediocre series.

 

Share this post


Link to post
Share on other sites

I never saw these movies and watched the first three with a group of friends and a couple beers last weekend. I can see why some people are super into this series but I wouldn't be able to watch it if I wasn't with a group of friends. It's more entertaining to watch them and be mind-boggled that it somehow spawned what soon will be eight movies and one of the most financially successful film franchises ever made. The first three are so obviously lower budget B-Movies, it's pretty amazing to watch them knowing what the series is now known for.

 

I'm looking forward to making my way through 4-7 soon...I think I will need friends and beer to get through them again. 

Share this post


Link to post
Share on other sites

I'm seeing a lot of (very self-indulgent, very click-baity) rankings of these movies in the lead-up to hashtag F8. Also, I just finished re-watching 1 through 7 last week. So I figured I'd post my personal ranking (also here on letterboxd, with rambly qualifications we all crave to read):

 

1. Fast Five (2011)

2. Fast & Furious 6 (2013)

3. The Fast and the Furious (2001)

4. 2 Fast 2 Furious (2003)

5. Furious 7 (2015)

6. The Fast and the Furious: Tokyo Drift (2006)

7. Fast & Furious (2009)

 

I know that these movies are mostly ultra-produced mass-appeal trash, but I can't help but like them. Not hearing great things about the eighth one tho

Share this post


Link to post
Share on other sites

This series is interesting to me because it seems the reason it's become a critical darling (among a certain kind of critic) is the same reason I can't get into any of them, which is the cheesy "We're la familia, bro" stuff. There's some pretty good sequences in 5 & 6, but these movies are so long and have so much bad drama in them. I want to like them (they're super diverse and the story of the franchise's mutation is fascinating!) but I really can't.

 

It sounds like you feel the same way about the melodramatic stuff, dium, and I'm impressed you got through them all (this is like, 15 hours of movie, right?) when you only actually liked one of them.

Share this post


Link to post
Share on other sites

I'm of two minds about the family fixation. It is very cheesy... there are even moments that I'd characterize as wide-eyed and dorky. In theory, I'm actually all about it: it's endearing. It's an effective foil to the muscle-car/muscle-bod machismo. They give all the cheesiest, most face-palmy-saccharine lines to the guy with the deepest voice and frowniest face and I approve.
 

But yeah, in practice, much of it crosses the line from endearing-embarrassing to just embarrassing. The lighthearted and/or celebratory family moments tend to work for me — angsty moments generally do not.

Share this post


Link to post
Share on other sites

I just finished watching F8 of the Furious. Anyone that has struggled with the last two is not going to like this one. I got drunk in the cinema on Coronas and laughed my way through it. Honestly, I just had so much fun with it that I couldn't fault the terrible plot twists and the violence-as-comedy bits. SPOILERS: Michelle Rodriguez does not fight an MMA type-person

 

My list isn't much different at the top but but it definitely changes after the top three.

 

1. Fast Five (2011)

2. Furious 7 (2015)

3. Fast & Furious 6 (2013)

4. F8 of the Furious (2017)

5. Fast & Furious (2009)

6. The Fast and the Furious (2001)

7. The Fast and the Furious: Tokyo Drift (2006)

8. 2 Fast 2 Furious (2003)

 

 

Share this post


Link to post
Share on other sites

So, I just watched Fast & Furious 6 again and I am impressed that they managed to retcon a bad performance in Fast & Furious: Tokyo Drift into a good one. Wooden? Nay, it is a man who is emotionally stunted after losing the love of his life.

 

Next, I noticed how few of the main villains actually die in Fast & Furious. So, they already have their origins story for a Suicide Squad style group in Fast X.

 

Bring back the non-dead Tran Brother from the first, Cole Hauser's character from 2F2F, the angry pseudo-Yakuza kid from Tokyo Drift, Braga (who reappeared in F6), Joaquim Alemeida in Fast 5 and maybe cast the angry Daughter of the dead Vince from the same movie, then get some of the dudes that didn't get obviously murdered in 6, round it out with Cypher from 8 and it would be perfect/terrible/brilliant continuation of the writers committing to their bullshit.

 

 

Share this post


Link to post
Share on other sites
3 minutes ago, twmac said:

So, I just watched Fast & Furious 6 again and I am impressed that they managed to retcon a bad performance in Fast & Furious: Tokyo Drift into a good one. Wooden? Nay, it is a man who is emotionally stunted after losing the love of his life.

 

Also, supposedly a millionaire after Fast 5, but somehow works under a small-time criminal ?

Share this post


Link to post
Share on other sites

Some people just have a taste for it that they can't stop, I mean they are all millionaires after 5 and they keep coming back. It also explains how he was able to just buy new cars and not give a shit about them getting destroyed.

 

Share this post


Link to post
Share on other sites

Create an account or sign in to comment

You need to be a member in order to leave a comment

Create an account

Sign up for a new account in our community. It's easy!

Register a new account

Sign in

Already have an account? Sign in here.

Sign In Now
Sign in to follow this