Last night, Steve and I went to see Furious 7 (part of the
Fast and Furious franchise) because it’s Furious 7. I mean, besides Vin Diesel,
they brought in The Rock and Jason
Statham? Duh. And as a bonus to everyone else, they had Djimon Hansou. And as a
special bonus to me, they had Tony Jaa, because they know exactly what I love.
Previews were for Spectre (James Bond, with significant
lines in the trailer, and no action. At first I was all ‘Mass Effect’, but no),
Mad Max: Fury Road (the trailer was two and a half minutes long, and had more flipping and
exploding cars than the entire Fast and Furious movies. How? I don’t know. It seems impossible. I
just know that every single car seemed to flip and explode. Maybe it had something
to do with the post-apocalypse spikes that seemed to be on every one), Ted 2
(which seemed like a movie I would go to until I actually saw the trailer. Now
I’m having second thoughts. It seems almost Ron Burgandy-ish, in that it’ll
probably be funny, but only got made because the first was successful) and
Straight Outta Compton (which I’d probably catch on Netflix if I was big into
rap. I’m not).
The movie starts with Deckard Shaw (Jason Statham, and let
me just say what a perfect villain name Deckard Shaw is for Jason Statham)
standing next to an unconscious Owen Shaw (the villain from the previous movie)
in a hospital room and vowing revenge. It then follows Shaw out of the
hospital, which has been nearly reduced to splinters, as if Shaw had fought his
entire way up there through the entire hospital staff, possibly with his
brother on his shoulders (his brother having survived a fiery plane crash on
the world’s longest runway in Fast Six).
From there, the movie slows down a bit, to do some heavy handed
dialogue about family from Mia (Jordana Brewster) before she’s shuffled off for
most of the movie to make way for more characters. Letty has some flashbacks to
her pre-amnesia days, so she leaves to find herself, Shaw kills Han in a car
crash that was shown at the end of Fast 6 and the middle of Tokyo Drift, and
then the plot is on, from the Caucases Mountains (parachuting cars) to Dubai
(jumping cars between buildings) to LA (all out warfare with helicopters and
drones, with the LAPD apparently none-the-wiser).
The movie continues some much beloved traditions: A never
ending supply of chargers for Dom to wreck after popping the front wheels of
the ground; introducing a female UFC champion for Michele Rodriguez to beat in
a fist fight (this time it’s Rhonda Rousey, last time it was Gina Carano); Paul
Walker winning a fist fight he has no business winning (against Tony Jaa this
time. I mean, come on); and enough car stunts to make me laugh myself silly.
The music is again by Brian Tyler, whom I thoroughly enjoy,
although I doubt I can acquire the score since it’s more of a Soundtrack movie
(ie lots of hip hop, not lots of strings). The humour is still there, the
stunts are bigger than ever, and there’s a fist fight on a door sliding down
several staircases. This is most definitely
a theatre movie.
One last note. The ending of the movie is more poignant than
usual. Most Fast and Furious movies I leave giddy and smiling at the
ridiculousness of it all. This had that amount of ridiculousness, but the way they
touched on Paul Walker’s death was a little bittersweet, but very touching. I
have to admit I had a small lump in my throat when the credits rolled.
