I know people like to joke about how these movies threw physics out the door 3 or 4 movies ago, but that was before Vin Diesel was literally using cars as grappling hooks.
Turns out, "owning it" can bear mighty fine fruit.
I feel like you know whether or not your on board for this film's wavelength when you hear the words "using cars as grappling hooks," but if your next thought is "Ok, but what else you got?" rest assured - that's only the first big set piece that returning director Justin Lin has in store. And they only get more audacious from there.
Fortunately, Lin and longtime F&F writer Chris Morgan balance the ever-increasing need to one-up the previous film's outlandish spectacle with an utter commitment to "yes, and"ing the emotional journeys of the characters involved in said vehicular tomfoolery. The films have mastered the breathless telanovela pacing of endless hidden secrets, switching allegiances, surprise resurrections, and even the pinnacle soap opera standbys of Tragic Amnesia and Long-Lost Siblings. But as cartoonish as these films get - which, by now, is Very - the secret to their success is that they always play the emotional stakes as genuine no matter how ridiculous the set dressing.
F9 opens with Dominic Toretto (Vin Diesel) and his wife Letty (Michelle Rodriguez) in hiding to keep their kid safe. Unfortunately (for them, but fortunately for us), no good ass-kicker is allowed to keep her ass-kicking boots hung up forever, and when they get word from their crew that an old enemy has resurfaced, Letty and Dom are drawn, along with Roman (Tyrese Gibson), Tej (Chris "Ludacris" Bridges), Ramsey (Natalie Emmanuel), into a plot involving Cipher (Charlize Theron), the cyber terrorist who blackmailed Dom into turning against his crew in the previous film, and (drumroll please) Jakob Toretto (John Cena), Dom's younger brother.
That's barely the first half-hour, this movie doesn't just go hard - it goes full anime. This is the Aquaman of Fast and Furious movies, and I say this as a compliment to both films. Vin Diesel has never been the strongest dramatic element of these films, but making this a family affair that can involve both Letty and Dom's sister Mia (Jordana Brewster) gives additional support to scenes where Dom has to glower angrily or glower guiltily or affectionately talk about family. And while the film spends a decent amount of time with the crew split off in pairs or threes on various missions, it does so in fun combinations and weaves the family back together regularly for the kind of big team-up set pieces that make these films work.
Even as the movie is throwing a lot of familiar characters and some pretty important new ones at the narrative, the film reveals itself to be about the necessity of communication and the ability to admit when you were wrong, even if you were wrong for the "right" reasons. At the same time as it's being "about" rad stuff like a trio of ladies (two of them in their 40s!) beating the shit outta a room full of dudes, or strapping rockets to a car to enter orbit, or using super magnets to flip an armored trailer.
As exuberant as the film is and as legit enjoyable as it is to see what they do with the return of Han (Sung Kang) and the new elements that storyline threads in, it's probably for the best that they're wrapping these movies up soon. F9 feels like a definite course-correction after Fate of the Furious, but still carries the increasing burden of living up the the "are you KIDDING ME?" moments of all the previous films. There's only so long you can keep that number of plates spinning, and F9 gets wobbly enough that it'll be a collapsing bridge too far for some.
But for now, they already strapped rockets to cars and it mostly worked for me, so screw it - let's see where Full Anime Fast & Furious goes.
No comments:
Post a Comment