Post by ronnierocketago on Apr 8, 2009 9:28:30 GMT
FAST & FURIOUS (2009) - ***1/2
This finished past the finish line #1 at the box-office last weekend with nearly $71 million, and nobody at FCM or the AwardsDaily Forums talks about this, whatever they be with good or bad feelings? Simply ignoring this won't help champion your little movie causes, or get your little movies produced on a greater or faster basis. I ranted years and years about goddamn Michael Bay, yet that hack still shot hits. Avoiding that asshole? We get TRANSFORMERS.
Some ADers I know have in PMs sent to me have dismissed this success. Some argue that it won because of a weak April scheduled field, which is legitimate, but that doesn't explain enough One foreigner wrote that "Americans these days go in droves to any movie with bimbos, ghetto cars, and bling bling." This begs two questions. One, some people still use the term "bling bling"? Second, If that is the case, then why did the fourth film (!) of a lucrative Hollywood franchise built around fucking illegal street racing have the biggest opening of the series so far? Better yet, why has nobody else prosperously copied this supposed easy moneymaking formula?
My point is, accept this reality, or be very vocal and present a legitimate logical argument against such a hit like FAST & FURIOUS if indeed you truely believe it deserves a public flogging. The worst that happens is, people disagree with you or since this is the Internet, be called an asshole or elitist or whatever (trust me, I would know.) Stand up and fight like American progressives of the last few years, don't just whine or be mute like their earlier comrades in 2001-2003.
Anyway, back on the road.
I was in high school when THE FAST AND THE FURIOUS was such a monster sleeper hit, which still baffles me. Why was it so big back in summer 2001? Were suburban whites too fascinated by the idea of urban racing? Did they buy into the media hype that the cast in Vin Diesel, Paul Walker, Michelle Rodriguez, and Jordana Brewster were the future stars of Hollywood? Or was it simply that for most of them that never watched the B-car exploitation drive-in fare from the 1950s to the 70s unlike me, this shit was new? All I know was, I was left incredibly unimpressed, in fact chiding it to everyone I know that it was practically a remake of POINT BREAK, just substitute bank robbing surfers for hijacking street racers.
That and it unfortunately gave hack filmmaker Rob Cohen a new career lease which we still suffer from to this very day from STEALTH to that last MUMMY film. Thanks movie, you asshole. I later caught John Singleton's 2 FAST 2 FURIOUS at a college screening, an inferior follow-up that somehow found a way to make fast cars boring. Never bothered with TOKYO DRIFT, if well come on its fucking Bow Wow. I had a good reason. So eight years, three sequels, and four stalled half-cocked acting careers later, all the original leads return for FAST & FURIOUS, and I didn't give a shit.
I mean for one thing, what's up with the silly title? If I didn't know any better, is it the first movie or the second or what? Did Universal lose the rights to the word the[/i]? I'm reminded of Sylvester Stallone's recent RAMBO, which somehow is a sequel to RAMBO III. Yes people make fun of the Roman numerials, whatever abused by ROCKY or STAR TREK, but at least they never confused me.
Quite honestly, I only attended my Saturday morning screening at the local theatre because nothing new was out. That and I was morbidly curious with how Diesel and Walker left this franchise supposedly for bigger and better things, only to come crawling back to this franchise after several flops later. You know their careers are in trouble when their last previous hits were Disney family fare (THE PACIFIER and EIGHT BELOW.) The redneck white trash crowd was large, much bigger than I expected, and they seemingly had a rather good time out of FAST & FURIOUS. I recognized this was going to do monster business, maybe even have some strong legs outside of opening weekend. Also, that I actually quite fucking enjoyed[/i] this too, the best of the series.
What gives?
Its not like this is a radical departure from the earlier lame pictures, and the whole series is glorified auto porn, and the dudes go see the wheels. In fact after my screening eating at the local Burger King, I was struck in overhearing a conversation by employees who were nerding out about the different models, paint jobs, and accessories featured in that whole FAST universe. A good start is with the thrilling opening action sequence with Diesel and his crew robbing fuel tanks at top speed on a Dominican Republic highway. For an action nerd like me, car chases are (too much) a dime a dozen, so I was genuinely surprised that for the first time in this FAST consecution, that I was actually excited by any moment regarding cars. That's a minor miracle. I also was tempted to make a joke about the lesbian Rodriguez smashing the trailer hitches to pieces, but I'm more mature than that. Also, I liked the trucker's pet iguana. No pugs around I'm afraid.
Hell all the car scenes in FAST & FURIOUS are well-shot, well-cut, and feature great stuntwork, if at least because director Justin Lin never takes the danger for granted, even with the CGI shots. In fact, I'm so impressed, I might even swallow my pride and give TOKYO DRIFT (which Lin previously helmed) a drive sometime. He can't just simply be a fluke, even if he also directed that stinker ANNAPOLIS...
But beyond that, I quickly realized Lin must have figured out that the cars are definately vital, but shouldn't be the whole show. So around them, he and his army of monkey scriptwriters craft a well treaded if still very effective B-actioneer movie with guns and girls around them. Yes there is no real surprises here, but do we keep using alot of these cliches? Because sometimes they still work if certain cliches are well-timed and executed, which I thought they were with FAST & FURIOUS (unlike say GYMKATA.)
Diesel gets pissed that a Mexican drug cartel had his woman murdered (which was off-screen, unlike her demise in LOST) so he infiltrates the villain's narcotics smuggling team of drivers to find the boss and of course murder his ass. I loved this random touch where he finds his lover's pet project, a car in total shambles. He rebuilds and refits it, drives it in the race and other sequences, planning to use it as basically a giant bomb to try to take out the villain. It's silly, but I guess I can't help but love such a sign of dedication to revenge, mixed with a nice fireball. Meanwhile, FBI agent Walker is investigating...you guessed it...the same Cartel, and in undercover joins that same squad so he and former buddy Diesel have your typical uneasy movie alliance between crook and cop to take down the same baddies. They help each other out, then betray the next, sometimes simultaneously. Inevitably after the gangsters escape from a botched police sting operation, Walker in great American action cinema fashion, throws his shield away and head off to Mexico for a final showdown. Such a notion was already older-than-the-hills when DIRTY HARRY did it, but fuck I aint complaining because if it works, it works.
Even though I didn't like THE FAST & THE FURIOUS, and this will sound silly, but I'm actually glad Diesel the Cueball is back. The guy just looks like he belongs in a car, and in retrospect maybe he realized he fucked up by quitting FAST. If he had stayed around, he could have had a long-running popular star vehicle like 007 that his XXX and RIDDICK fizzled in trying. Take a scene when he's driving down the smuggler's mountain tunnel, in parallel tracks head to head with a hench wheelman. Diesel sees deadend ahead, but can't turn for he's blocked. So at the nick of time he jumps onto the other car through the window, knocking out the driver who promptly gets run over. It's such a riduclously retarded moment that violates every possible law of physics, and yet I loved it. So I guess I can thank Diesel for transmuting something stupid into something slick (but his power is very limited. Just watch BABYLON A.D.)
But I'm also immediately reminded why I've never liked Walker. With his cheap-looking blonde hair, giving off the vibe of undeserving arrogance, and lacking the ability to act, I actually cheered whenever he's obligatory chewed out by his superiors, or especially when he loses the race. Him wearing suit and tie adds points to his dip shit quota. Like Kurt Thomas in GYMKATA, he just comes off as a pussy. In fact, maybe I greatly despised 2 FAST 2 FURIOUS because he was the hero. And I say maybe only because I would need to rewatch that to test my hypothesis, which I won't.
BTW, why is it that in everyone of those FAST flicks that Walker did, he always loses the first race? Think about it. He also was the centerpiece of a dumb sequence when he spear tackles a criminal off the roof of an apartment onto a car below, and neither nary get a scratch.[/i] Dude, you aint Diesel. Don't even try to compete with him. If anything, he's asked a relevant question: Why is he still a cop? Walker obviously enjoys racing those cars on the government's dime and time, and using his badge only to escape prosecution of endless traffic violations.
So I'm glad that FAST & FURIOUS ends with that abstract visual promise, which my audience loved, that indeed Pussy won't play policeman anymore. In the inevitable new line of sequels secured by the reved up box-office, Pussy and Cueball can drive cars and steal shit without that law issue getting inbetween them. If FA5T & FURIOU5 or FURIOUS 666 or whatever the hell is as fun as FAST & FURIOUS, I'll be there.
If not, I'll just Netflix it.