The Fate of the Furious
For any film franchise to be delivering its eighth installment, it must be doing something right and have a very loyal fan base. In the case of our latest offering “The Fate of the Furious”, the latter is true, with long-time loyal fans continuing to show up in droves in support of their beloved car movies. But is the series still getting it right? After the mammoth success of Furious 7, driven by the high stakes action of the film and of course the departure of the much loved Paul Walker, the last entry in 2015 ended on a sentimental note as Walker’s character of Brian O’Conner drove off into the sunset, leaving the street scene behind. It was a nice way to send his character off, but where would that leave the continuing story without him?
As soon as Furious 7 ended, Vin Diesel announced there would be three more films in the series, kick starting a new trilogy, after parts 5, 6 and 7 were supposedly one trilogy, meaning parts 1, 3 and 4 were another trilogy? And where does that put the 3rd and forgettable entry, “Tokyo Drift? Who cares, that one doesn’t really count.
There are enough characters in the Fast and Furious family to continue with stories for years in the wake of Brian O’Conner, but his absence is certainly felt in this film. and the other challenge the filmmakers had with F8, was topping the ridiculous stunts of its predecessors, especially since that film pitted its cars spending more time in midair than on the road. But in a clever move, our latest entry in the long-running saga takes an interesting turn, making the character of Dom Toretto (usually the head of The Family) into the bad guy, but why?
His motivations for turning on his crew are well justified,
with his strings being pulled by the crafty and cold-as-ice villain of the
piece, Cypher (Charlize Theron). She’s certainly a new kind of villain for this
series, whereas all her counterparts from earlier installments spent some time
behind the wheel, she hides in her digital fortress, controlling anything she
wants from he her high-tech command centre. And she literally can control
anything she wants, including 1000 cars on the streets of Manhattan.
As you will see form the trailer for this film, you know
from the beginning that Dom goes Rogue. What remains of his team are
reassembled, with one new member – the one guy who tried to kill them all in
Furious 7. Jason Statham’s lethal assassin Deckard Shaw is back, busting his
way out of prison and ordered to work with the crew to bring Dom down. Surely a
gamble on behalf of Mr. Nobody (Kurt Russell) considering the history between
Shaw and Hobbs (Dwayne Johnson) in
particular. But somehow, these two brutes manage to put their differences aside
and actually work together. It was an interesting plot development, but I
didn’t quite believe their new found relationship would work so well,
considering the amount of damage Shaw caused the last time. But alas, it’s a
movie – suspend disbelief and go with it.
The story is straightforward this time around, but I will give the
filmmakers credit for adding some emotional weight to proceedings. Vin Diesel
certainly brings new life to the character he’s been living with for the past
sixteen years, and in this film you will actually see Dom smile and cry, but
when you know why he’s turned bad, you can understand. Cypher, a pretty blonde
woman but pure evil, finally knows how to make Dom vulnerable and uses that to
her advantage. But good old Dom Toretto has a few tricks up his sleeves, and
possesses the one weapon Cypher does not – street smarts. The actions scenes are once again, over the top, ridiculous but bloody entertaining. The film is more grounded than the last one – cars don’t fly necessarily, but they will drive themselves, fall out of buildings and drive swiftly on ice. So what’s next? Will the cars of Fast and Furious transform into robots and turn against their drivers? How cool would that be? Oh hang on, the Transformers have that bag of tricks.
You can expect two more films in the Furious saga, bowing out in 2019 and 2021 respectively, which would bring us 10 films in 20 years. Surely that would have to be the end of it. But I’ve also heard some rumors of a spin-off film featuring the characters of Hobbs and Shaw (Dwayne Johnson and Jason Statham) which would be entertaining to say the least. Their chemistry is good, and they share some laughs in this entry, as well as the best action scenes. Statham in particular is a standout, especially as he boards a plane to rescue a baby. What? I know what you must be thinking, but rest assured it all makes sense in The Fate and The Furious, even it isn’t completely plausible. But that’s not why we watch these films. Buckle up and enjoy the ride… again, and brace yourself for more cars and explosions…again, over the next few years.
Paul Walker would be proud.
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