First
off, I should point out that pretty much everything I have to say
about this movie should be read with the understanding that this
franchise and the specific vehicular action sub-genre to which it
belongs are simply not my cup of tea. I understand the appeal, and
I'm not saying that these movies are necessarily bad or even poorly
made, just that I don't personally have much interest in them. I
can't really relate to the die hard Fast & Furious fan, and I
can only assume based on the caricature I have in my head that the
endless tire screeching and explosions in this sixth installment are
more than enough to satisfy them.
Fast & Furious 6, or possibly just Fast 6, or Faster and
Furiouser, is the story of an elite team of professional car thieves
who for some reason that I gather was explained in a previous film
are keen to team up with the government agent who once hunted them in
order to track down an even more ruthless group of criminals in
exchange for full pardons. As you might have guessed by now, I have
not seen any of the previous movies in this series past the first
one, which as I've mentioned, didn't really do anything for me. I'd
say its a credit to the writing that someone like me with so little
experience can have no problem understanding the character dynamics
in a film with five previous chapters, but then I'm forced to
acknowledge that the shallowness of said characters has as much to do
with that as anything actually clever going on in the screenplay.
As
if that matters. At the risk of sounding condescending or elitist,
which I genuinely do not intend to be, I highly doubt that anyone
comes to this movies at this point for the character development or
the drama. This series is and from what I can see always has been
about the action set pieces centered around high-testosterone fueled
vehicular mayhem. Apparently it is a stable of this franchise that a
majority of the stunt work is done via practical effects, and I have
to say that this element, the thing we all came to see anyway, is
well done overall. While they all looked good and are pulled off with
style and precision, I found the action scenes to go on way too long,
but I imagine that's sort of the point, and this wouldn't be a
problem to someone who is ready to slog through it.
Where
the film falters is exactly where you would expect it to, namely the
nearly absent plot. It seems almost pedantic to criticize the plot in
a Fast & Furious movie, but here you go. The main thrust of the
story finds the group trying to save an old comrade who was
apparently thought to have died in a previous movie, but in fact woke
up with amnesia and has since been recruited into the bad guy's
group. The set up of this might just take the Stupid Henchman Award
away from Parker, but its a flimsy subtext to add some “this time
its personal” resolve for the main characters, and in a movie
where the real stars are the cars anyway, you just have to forgive
stuff like this. This is the kind of movie where whole characters
exist purely so that they can be cut to for a comic relief one liner,
and while I wasn't laughing, everyone else in my theater was, so what
do I know?
I
might have actually seen the last film in this series, except that at
the time, I was not quite as religious in my commitment to seeing every movie starring Dwayne “The Rock” Johnson. While not as
phenomenal as his role in Pain And Gain, he is easily the best part
of the movie, and he isn't in it nearly enough. Every time the focus
shifts to the comparatively uncharismatic Vin Diesel, Ludacris,
or...the other people whose names escape me, I find myself wanting
the entire movie to be The Rock kicking ass on top of a car. The
villains are particularly boring, so much so that I didn't even catch
what the main bad guy's plan was (apparently something about a
microchip, maybe) until well into the third act, and just assumed he
was some sort of anarchist.
Again,
all of these downsides are immaterial to the heart of the film, which
is the chain of car chases that connect each incidental and pointless
bit of exposition leading to the next car chase. I certainly want
more in a movie, but if you like this sort of thing, the escalating
intensity of stuff banging into each other, people banging into each
other, and various things blowing up whether or not they would
actually be that explosive should meet the standard you're shooting
for. The climax is fairly epic, taking place on the longest airplane
runway in the world, the kind you only see in old school video games
that only end conveniently right after you've beaten the boss, and
with the exception of one minor character's death that will no doubt
be resolved with an amnesiac resurrection twist later on in the
series, everything wraps up nicely for everyone we're supposed to
like.
In
short, Fast & Furious 6 is exactly what you want it to be,
if you want it at all, which I don't. Apparently they will be
spinning off The Rock's character into his own movie series going
forward, which I will almost definitely be seeing, if only because
losing the baggage of these other characters I don't care about and
just kicking ass with very little need for a complicated back story is
exactly what I want to see in a movie starring The Rock. I may or may
not come back for Fast 7: Faster Then The Furiousest, depending on
whether or not he's involved, but as a non-fan, I can easily say that
this film was visually engaging enough that even given my lack of
interest, I don't find the prospect of doing so entirely dreadful.
Then again, I've got another Madea movie coming up later this year, so
maybe I'm just saving up all of my dread for that.
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