Faster - Benjy's Take

So, Evan posted his review before mine, plus his team made our fantasy football playoffs and mine didn’t, even though we had identical records. Suffice it to say, Evan has been schooling me lately. But he’s also doing a PhD, so I’m going to cut him some slack. Because if you do great things, you can be a great jerk. On with the show …

Faster started in our consciousnesses as a poster on the wall of the movie theatre during the summer. It was a simple poster, depicting a car, in front of which was a man standing mostly out of frame. The only thing in the frame was his left arm, tattooed up, and holding a gun. “Ah” I said to myself, “I shall put that movie on my radar.”

Later, we learned the Dwayne ‘The Rock’ Johnson would be that armed man, and we saw trailers, and I said to Evan “Our continued survival depends heavily upon seeing this movie.” So when we had the chance, we saw it.

The movie started off well. Driver (Johnson’s character) was released from prison. There wasn’t much dialogue except for a warden who droned on a bit, but the movie cleverly used the audio to show Driver was tuning him out. From there, he was let out of the main gate, where he turned and ran down the road to a junkyard. He pulled back the cover of a car, got in, and found a name and a gun. Drove to the address that came with the name and pulled up across the street. Walked across the road while traffic slammed on their brakes, strode into the office, and stormed into the cubicle farm on the back, found the guy he was looking for, and shot him in the head. And I said to myself “What a wonderful life.” No, wait - I said to myself “This movie is AWESOME!”

Then he met up with some people to get a list of names. And the movie went downhill. You see, it tried to tell a story. It had a cop (named Cop) who was two weeks from retirement on the case. I guess calling him Cliché would've been too on the nose. It introduced a hitman who underwent a lot of character development. Which was a mistake. Halfway through, it wedged in a message about forgiveness instead of revenge. Which was a mistake. Don’t get me wrong, I think it’s a tremendous message to spread … in real life. In movies, give me action and gunplay anytime. And this movie failed.

There were maybe three shootouts, each of which lasted under a minute. There was hand to hand fight, which even in slow-motion lasted less than 30 seconds. There were a couple car chases, which were good, but short. The climax ended in three bullets, without any action at all.

The movie was going for plot, dialogue, and character development. It was desperately trying to be a Critic’s movie, instead of an action movie. I wouldn’t have minded, except I wanted to see an action movie. That’s what I go to movies to see, especially when they star The Rock. I do not go to see stories that happen to have guns in them. Maybe I should have clued in when the assassin (named Killer) packed for his mission by taking his pistol, but leaving his assault rifle behind. At least his girlfriend-then-wife can look after them. Yes, he got married. Yes, he promised to stop killing people. Yes, he got character development. Yes, I was disappointed.

As the movie progressed with less and less action, I progressively downgraded the movie. It finally ended before I got to “Avoid at all costs” and instead landed on “Watch it on TV if it’s on, but only if you’re bored.” Why? It’s got good music (by Clint Mansell, composer of one of the greatest songs ever) and it has some camera shots that I’ve seen rarely, if ever. A shot from behind the speedometer? Neat. Also, one of a corridor at an incredibly disconcerting angle. And of course, you should watch it if you curious about what happens when they suck all the action out of an action movie. Just don’t spend money on it. Like the studio that made it.