[The Fast and the Furious franchise was the first one I visited on this blog. In anxious anticipation for Fast Five, those posts reappear now only slightly reedited, and now also with links and pics.]
Vin Diesel’s cameo at the end of Tokyo Drift suggested better things for the Fast and the Furious franchise than what it had become. Indeed, the fourth film, Fast & Furious, is the first true sequel. This movie effectively continues the story told in The Fast and the Furious, which it can afford to do by reuniting pretty much the entire cast from that film. This means we see a return of Paul Walker, Michelle Rodriguez, Jordana Brewster, and most importantly Vin Diesel. Given this advantage, Fast & Furious does not have to piddle around with all-new characters in the context of an ostensible sequel the way Tokyo Drift did. Even though most of the crew from Tokyo Drift has returned, most notably director Justin Lin, the sense of continuity most people will get is with the Rob Cohen’s first movie.
So what kind of heavenly convergence had to take place to get everyone back? The answer appears to lie in how their careers were doing. Vin Diesel is the best example of this, and I suspect without his involvement, this movie wouldn’t have come together in any form. Thinking back to the early 2000s, Vin Diesel’s star was on the rise. Many had pegged him as this generation’s true action superstar, an heir to the sweaty, vaguely homoerotic throne left by Arnold Schwarzenegger. Indeed, in a world where somehow Orlando Bloom and Shia LeBlllerrrpphhf are somehow action head-liners, a muscular, bald man like Diesel seems like a sane alternative. Between The Fast and the Furious’ Dom and Pitch Black’s Riddick, Diesel attemptws farming the Riddick character into a franchise, resulting in the epic, universe-spanning, lame The Chronicles of Riddick. This did not prove successful, and no sequels would be forthcoming. Nothing much came of xXx either. Despite no massive Terminator-like successes, Diesel’s career did come to resemble Scharzenegger’s in one important way: they each quickly resorted to awful tough-guy -behaves-effeminate comedies, with Diesel’s The Pacifier in 2005..Then there was the Riddick-lite Babylon A.D.
So in 2009 Diesel was in a position to reconsider his Fast and the Furious franchise, something he was no longer above. An actor in need of a hit, returning to a successful, beloved character – this is quite common. His co-stars would follow suit because – Look, do I really have to explain this one? Quick! Name a Paul Walker film that’s not a part of this franchise! Hell, I can’t do that, and I’ve been actively researching the guy.
So, Fast & Furious...I kind of love that title. I love all the titles for this series, as they refuse to make any kind of consistent sense. This entry realizes audiences today are too busy with their [insert cliché complaint about the younger generation], and so wisely eliminates the article “the” – which goes on loan to The Final Destination.
Consciously echoing Part One, this film opens with a high-speed big rig heist involving Dom and his gang. And in true sequel fashion, it is played bigger. Tonight’s big rig drives through the DOMinican Republic towing six gasoline tankers – this is called a land-train! Up comes a convoy of tricked out trucks, led by Dominic Toretto (Vin Diesel, again), along with Letty (Michelle Rodriguez, again), Han Lue (Sung Kang, again), and Don Omar (as himself, and for the first time, since Don Omar is this entry’s traditional “rapper in a cameo role”). Han’s presence indicates that this is technically a prequel to Tokyo Drift, for what little it’s worth. The only problem this presents is trying to work out dates – either Tokyo Drift takes place in the future (it is set in Tokyo), or this one takes place in the past. A dusty, rather caveman-like past, it seems. It’s not worth thinking too hard about.
In general, reusing characters from before is a nice audience shorthand. An ideal viewer already knows Dom’s various relationships, and so feels what happens more strongly. In a sense I am that ideal viewer, since this whole series is fresh in my memory. Though some backstory from 2001 is assumed, and while it isn’t complicated, that’s still a potential hurdle.
As for the content of this big rig heist, well...it’s my favorite thing in this entire series, partly because it echoes old westerns. Letty (Dom’s girlfriend, lest we forgot) climbs onto the speeding gas tankers, releasing them as the stunt trucks tow them away. Again, one should never question the logic behind this series. Ultimately Letty is in trouble, as the big rig speeds out of control down a harsh downgrade towards a huge cliff! It’s up to Dom to rescue his beloved. Letty surfs the hood of his car like Zoe Bell, and – in a wildly unlikely stunt they spoiled in the trailer – Dom speeds underneath a bouncing, flaming tanker. Though such a shot could never be achieved without special effects, the individual visual elements at play remain practical, so that’s a nice way to avoid dodgy CGI. I like that.
The crew goes their separate ways during a beach party. Dom bids Han farewell to “go do his own thing,” namely steal from the yakuza and die violently. Dom and Letty have a crucial romantic one-to-one, Dom temporarily going his own way for Letty’s safety.
One more crucial character to establish, this one being (yawn) Brian O’Conner (Paul Walker, again for the third damn time). Though they siphoned most of the material from Point Break in the original, the foot chase through the backyards was left more or less alone, so Brian goes ahead and recreates that one here in the streets of Los Angeles. This being post-Casino Royale’s parkour, mainstream audiences cannot help but be underwhelmed, especially after the land-train sequence. In the end Brian obtains a name from his perp (that name being David Park), which he reports back to his FBI superiors in their stark, movie-tech offices. So Brian has been reinstated back into the police force, and is hot on the tail of the Braga drug cartel.
Down in Panama City, Dom gets a phone call from his sister Mia (Jordana Brewster, again), learning that Letty has been murdered. Now that kinda came out of left field, but it goes a long way to explaining the lengthy scenes with Dom and Letty earlier. (It also satisfies the “Michelle Rodriguez always dies” clause.) And now the central plot becomes instantly clear – Revenge! After the vague what-have-you of Tokyo Drift, this is most welcome. To me, at least, if not Dom.
Shortly following Letty’s funeral, Dom and Mia observe the site of Letty’s fatal auto accident. Director Lin employs a stylistic trick that should really irritate me, where Letty’s murder flashback plays directly alongside Dom’s introspection. Vin Diesel makes this work, as he always makes the emotional stuff with Dom work. Ever the gearhead, Dom discovers an obvious clue in the road that of course no investigators could find – trace amounts of nitrometh, and the start of Dom’s journey.
Naturally Brian is also on the trail of Letty’s murderer, mostly because she was an operative working with him on the Braga case. Brian’s story is not nearly as emotional, serving mostly as a plot device to bring law enforcement issues to the story, which is just as it should be. So, while Brian is tracking down this “David Park” – via mostly legal means – Dom is getting his information by beating up low-level goon types. This series of plot threads connects when Dom and Brian both happen upon David Park at once, and both learn that Braga will be hiring drug mule drivers in a downtown street race. And with all the fisticuff gruntwork Dom has employed, and Brian’s earlier foot chase, this film is shaping up to be a more traditional action flick than any of its predecessors, with situations that can be resolved by non-car means And after 2 Fast 2 Furious, a police procedural where car racing was the only solution, this seems a bit saner. Is it the right move for this series...?
No matter. A montage depicts both Dom and Brian preparing for the race, Dom with his black 1970 Chevrolet Chevelle SS and Brian modifying an impounded Nissan Skyline GT-R R34.
We’re nearing the climax of Act One, so it’s street race time! As in the first, this takes place in downtown L.A., so the filmmakers will have to work harder than usual to keep these things from blurring together in my mind. It turns out this race is a tryout for the final spot in Braga’s mule team, between Dom, Brian, and two other anonymous racers who are not going to win. Braga’s number two man Ramon Campos (John Ortiz) briefs the drivers, alongside token hot chick Gisele (Gal Gadot, 2004's Miss Israel). The race starts with this film’s most irritating use of CGI, and at least it’s diegetic: a CGI HOD GPS. This GPS feature literally equates this action sequence with a video game, but that was obviously the point, so I cannot complain. So soon enough the most anonymous driver of all crashes violently, definitely killing him and almost certainly killing countless innocent drivers involved – You know, in films like this there are not people in cars. Cars are simply moving obstacles that look pretty when they crash. It’s impossible to enjoy most action movies when attempting a moral critique.
And speaking of questionable actions, Brian is soon speeding recklessly down the alleyways, narrowly missing that most elusive and fabled of creatures, the L.A. pedestrian. In the end it all comes down to Brian versus Dom, in a final quarter mile straightaway that clearly recalls the first film, CGI engine tours and all. Dom wins, gaining the spot on Braga’s crew, but he has to “cheat” for once to beat Brian.
But let’s not worry about bland Brian. He secures his spot on the mule team by promptly arresting one of the pre-selected drivers, a hateful, even-worse version of Kid Rock.
Campos welcomes both Dom and Brian to the team. They celebrate in a warehouse rave which gives my opportunity to mention one series trademark I have neglected so far. In every movie, we will see girls kissing each other. Of course us guys love this sort of thing, but it’s impossible to bring it up without seeming crass. And Brian continues his FBI investigation, discovering fingerprints, while Dom has the grander task of rejecting a budding romance with Gisele in favor of mourning his departed Letty.
Let’s move on to the mule work – in silent Brian’s case, a mute mule mole. A big rig transports the four mules just past the Mexican border, where Gisele (who reminds me of Mirage from The Incredibles) loads their four various cars with enough heroin to sustain Tony Montoya for half an hour. In other words, about $80 million worth. Their mission involves speeding this shipment over the border, past a U.S. border patrol agency that is competent, well-financed, technologically equipped, and obviously fictional. The mules race a vaguely defined window of time, speeding through secret tunnels underneath a mountain. Whether or not these tunnels are mostly practical effects I cannot say. They’re a bit too claustrophobic for a good car chase, however.
Okay, powering through...Braga’s men have a double cross planned on the U.S. side, resulting in a shoot out action sequence (seeing as Dom has already used his beloved NOS to explode the Nissan Skyline GT-R R34 and black 1970 Chevrolet Chevelle SS). Dom and Brian escape in a Hummer filled with all the heroin, which they then go and hide in an impound lot – which will make a fine setting for a later action sequence. Then they hide out with Mia, and various callbacks are made to Part One. Sequels in general often rely on callbacks. Used well, this can be rewarding to series fans while flying over the heads of newcomers. Used poorly, the entire sequel relies upon the work someone else had already done. This film uses its callbacks fairly lightly (there isn’t much from The Fast and the Furious to call back to), so it fares pretty well.
Brian has standard conflicts with both Dom and his FBI superiors. In the end he is able to set up a meeting with Braga at the impound lot, to exchange the heroin. Sigh! I complained about Part Two's standard “bring down the drug kingpin” storyline, and when this movie loses sight of its equally boilerplate revenge story, it is reduced to this. And it’s all rather too talkative. Consider the matter of revenge. Even Tarantino, that most talkative of filmmakers, made his Kill Bill epic a bit of hokum with minimal (for him) dialogue. And Fast & Furious does not have the weight of that thing. So all I’ll say about the plot now is this – it’s revealed Campos is really Braga, and as such his personality changes completely, and I liked him better as Campos. Braga qua Braga lacks all bravado.
A quick thought, giving this movie altogether too much due: per the title, Fast & Furious, perhaps Brian is mean to be “Fast,” while Dom is “Furious.” Eh?...Sweet Jebus, I’ve been thinking about these movies too long!
When things are all said and done, our heroes head alone to a dusty, dusty Mexican pueblo (a welcome far cry from the neon and chrome of Tokyo) to capture Braga (née Campos) and bring him across the border. (Gisele offers a little aid in setting this up.) Braga in tow, they lead his goon army on a desert car chase, Dom in his iconic black 1972 Ford Torino and Brian in his less-than-iconic something else. Of course this damn chase has to make use of those border tunnels from earlier, and there is little new going on here, except this scene is a “chase” rather than a “race.” And here’s something I love – just before the chase, Braga actually has a “We’re not so different, you and I” moment with Dom. That’s pretty hard to take seriously.
Brian is the first to burst from the tunnels on the U.S. side, and this time the border patrol, so ridiculously omnipresent before, is completely out to lunch. They don’t even make a token presence, because that would lessen the threat from Braga’s automotive Stormtroopers. And then Brian crashes his something else just like Letty’s car I have not mentioned before back when she was murdered. And Letty’s murderer Fenix (Laz Alonso) is about to shoot Brian dead when Dom just up and smashes his black 1972 Ford Torino into him (Fenix). Action sequence complete, the U.S. border patrol helicopters feel safe to appear in the distance. Dom makes two decisions here that would seem out of character had he not been given nominal character development – he chooses to let Braga live, and he chooses to give himself up.
In an epilogue, Judge Ito (well, it looked like him, as out-of-date as that reference is) sentences Dom to 25 years to life, despite his recent heroism. Later on, a prison bus transfers Dom across the fields when three black cars surround it, driven by Brian, Mia and Gisele. [New commentary.] This is an obvious setup for Part Five, and I dearly look forward to the payoff.
Though this is easily the most justified of all the sequels, the franchise as a whole remains hopelessly addicted to melodrama in addition to its automotive antics. Given the budgets, this is probably the maximum amount of action we can expect per film, and yet it always seems like the bare minimum needed. Decent plotting and writing can serve to improve the straight-aways between action sequences, but there’s no call for such niceties in this middle-of-the-road series. Whatever good writers remain in Hollywood are certainly more valuable elsewhere. And as plots go, Fast & Furious actually has, I think, the strongest of the bunch. The Fast and the Furious is close to it, though. But really, my assessment of The Fast and the Furious could double as my assessment of Fast & Furious (titles confusing you yet?). It’s all rather...okay. Vin Diesel remains the one element truly making things interesting.
Fast & Furious, for its confidence in a reunited cast and returning crew, easily grossed more than any of its predecessors. In its opening weekend alone, Fast & Furious made more than Tokyo Drift did in its entire U.S. run, namely around $70 million (also making it nearly as valuable as Braga’s stolen heroin). The movie was put out in what is still ostensibly spring, though in content and performance it really seems like a mini summer movie slightly ahead of schedule. History is repeating itself with Fast Five, now heralded as the surprisingly-early official start to Summer 2011. And at this stage, I am strangely, unironically excited about that entry. It marks the return of director Justin Lin, whose action chops have improved tremendously in his time with this franchise. It’s taken a while, but it seems the Fast and the Furious franchise has marked out its niche: Blatantly standard action boilerplate stories, combined with ridiculous yet practical car action sequences. With action cinema being what it is today, I’m happy for that.
RELATED POSTS
• No. 1 The Fast and the Furious (2001)
• No. 2 2 Fast 2 Furious (2003)
• No. 3 The Fast and the Furious: Tokyo Drift (2006)
• No. 5 Fast Five (2011)
No comments:
Post a Comment