Fast & Furious

By the time most action movie franchises limp to a fourth instalment they’re usually dying a slow undignified death with talentless straight to DVD offerings. It is rare to see a sequel bounce back to the big screen complete with the entire original cast. Perhaps the failing fortunes of these cast members can help explain this strange phenomenon. Michelle Rodriguez got ‘Lost’ then went to prison, Paul Walker swam ill-advisedly ‘Into the Blue’ and most shamefully of all Vin Diesel made ‘The Pacifier’. ‘The Fast and the Furious’ still represents a career high for each, despite being at its best just a hip hop flavoured remake of vintage Keanu Reeves effort ‘Point Break’. You can’t help but feel that if anyone’s careers had taken them where they'd expected, they wouldn’t be back doing this again.

‘Fast & Furious’ finds former friends FBI agent Brian (Walker) and illegal street racer Dom (Diesel) reuniting to take down the vicious drug lord responsible for the death of their mutual friend. Of course the only way to possibly do this is with a series of increasingly implausible car stunts. Why? because that’s just what justice means. Much like its predecessors, ‘Fast & Furious’ is heavily reliant on a distracting mix of gratuitous close ups (of both pretty girls and cars) and pounding hip hop beats to stop its audience from searching for substance. It’s a low brow tactic which has proved resiliently effective and lucrative.

Unfortunately ‘Fast & Furious’ only lives up to its boastful name some of the time. The film’s frequent attempts at character drama are slow ordeals that flirt dangerously with dullness. Without the help of a high octane action sequence the cast are incapable of generating any convincing emotional intensity. It’s unlikely anyone will be fooled that the character’s personal dramas are really anything more than a means of setting up the next enjoyable chase scene.

The film’s well choreographed and CGI enhanced action scenes make it at times an enjoyable guilty pleasure. The film regurgitates the successful components of its popular predecessors, without ever threatening to add any originality or substance. The surprising box office success of ‘Fast & Furious’ show’s there’s a continued public appetite for entertaining eye candy. It will be interesting to see whether the studio is confident enough to risk a fifth instalment and whether its resurgent cast will be quite so quick to abandon a profitable ship the second time around. The question is just how many times the same thrills can bring a smile big enough to make people forgive such obvious failings? The answer appears to be four times... and counting.