Furious 7

My Grade:  B+

Here we have a franchise that started off grounded somewhat in reality and almost felt believable back in 2001 with the first entry The Fast and the Furious. It was inspired by a magazine article called “Racer X” written by Ken Li in the May 1998 issue of Vibe Magazine. And, now, it has become a monstrously successful and absurdly unrealistic action franchise with seven entries and perhaps a few more to come. This is a crazy world we live in, right? The films have gotten more and more insane as the franchise has pressed on through its 14 years and Furious 7 is, as expected, the most insane entry yet. Insane, yes, but a white-knuckled thrill ride of the highest order.

Furious 7 brings Dom Toretto (Vin Diesel) and his crew of street racers considerable danger as their past comes back to haunt them. In Fast & Furious 6, the team took down a guy named Owen Shaw and left him in a coma. Now, his older brother Deckard is out for revenge. The thing about Deckard is that he is basically a superhuman killing machine that is nearly impossible to track down and even harder to kill. Even worse, he already killed one of Dom’s crew in Tokyo (which took place in the fourth and weakest entry in the franchise, The Fast and the Furious:  Tokyo Drift) so this one is personal. The hunt for Deckard takes Dom’s team across the globe and requires them to pull off a number of elaborate heists in order to get a shot at Shaw.

Despite the cliche revenge plot and the cliche backstory for the badguy and the cliche tropes of secretive government organizations, this movie is very original in its action. No other film franchise has mastered the art of creating fresh takes on car chases time and time again quite like this franchise. With car chases being a dime a dozen in film, it’s nice to see something unique. Whether it’s realistic or not, it doesn’t matter because if we’re honest, no movie car chase is realistic. So why not go all out? That’s what Furious 7 does. Whether it’s cars skydiving onto a road to then battle with a weaponized bus, or it’s a bulletproof super car jumping between skyscrapers in Abu Dabi, it all works when the franchise is built on physics defying absurdity. And that absurdity is outstanding because it isn’t taken seriously. The filmmakers relish in the absurdity so we are able to sit back and bask in the pure adrenaline of it all.

What this flick offers that some of its other action genre contemporaries don’t is a heart. With all the outrageous action and almost cartoonish levels of violence and explosions, it stays grounded in the bond that these characters share which goes beyond friendship. Might I say it’s like they’re family? I might as well say that since Dom says it about 64 times in every one of the films. So, it’s a little ham-fisted with the family stuff, but it doesn’t just have the characters saying they are family; the characters act like family. Their loyalty to each other makes you root for them.

The acting in this film is nothing to write home about, though. Diesel grunts through all his on-the nose dialogue, Tyrese and Ludacris are hit-and-miss with some of their “witty” banter, and the little bit of dialogue delivered by MMA star Ronda Rousey in her cameo is horrendous. She can certainly throw down in a fight scene, though. The surprise, though, is I have never thought the late Paul Walker was much of an actor, but he is very good here. This is the role he will always be remembered for and that’s fitting because it was perfect for him. It’s honestly a shame he won’t be around to bring Brian O’Conner to life anymore.

Overall, Furious 7 is basically a superhero movie disguised as a plain old action movie about fast cars. It’s outrageous in every sense of the word but it stays grounded in the relationships between the characters and focuses on the loyalty they have for each other despite the constant, death-defying adventures they undertake. It’s just a fun ride.