The Fate of the Furious (2017)
Action, Crime
Directed By: F. Gary Gray
Despite the many changes this franchise has taken over its sixteen years of life, there have always been constants. The most important of them all, as everyone surely knows, is family. This is the idea that has grown to be the center of the franchise and take it from street-racing Point Break rip-off to high stakes action sci-fi. Now eight movies deep they decide to finally show us what happens when Dominic Toretto betrays his one true belief, family. This proves to be a totally serviceable plot to get the gang back together, driving cars, shooting guns, and blowing things up in The Fate of the Furious (seriously though, what's going on with the naming of this franchise, it's bonkers).
Now living his dream life with Letty (Michele Rodriguez) in Cuba, Dom (Vin Diesel) gets sucked back into the life by a mysterious cyber-terrorist named Cipher (Charlize Theron). They have no idea why, but Dom has decided to betray his family for her and destroy all that he has claimed to love. When it becomes clear to them he's turned the team realizes they're the only ones who can stop him, and they will do it by any means necessary. This 'Cipher' is more dangerous than anyone they have come up against before and it's going to take a lot of horsepower to take her down.
There was a lot of pressure on this movie to prove to its fandom that it can keep going in the absence of one of its fundamental characters. The loss of Paul Walker was a tragedy, one that many believed should have stopped this series in its tracks. They pressed on regardless and whether you like it or not an eighth movie is here, and if you ask me, they handle his loss as well as anyone could. There are only two moments where you feel the lack of Brian in the story and that's when the film specifically calls attention to it.
They don't erase his influence on the film or ignore that his character exists, but they also don't keep reminding you that he's gone. What they do instead is push some of our favorite members of the team into more defined roles. Guys like The Rock's Hobbs and Jason Statham's Deckard Shaw get a real chance to shine and become the highlight of the movie. Their characters get to do some really unexpected things that will surely be problematic for some fans, but for those who can embrace what's going on, it's an absolute blast.
There are some interesting decisions made in the story, not all of which pay off. With Dom betraying his core value it's hard not to spend a decent chunk of his scenes just being angry with him for doing it and even once it is explained why you're never truly satisfied with it all. Charlize Theron is also totally wasted as the villain, she's one-note and given basically nothing to do. As I said, the plot is serviceable but, it gets us into some of the most ambitious, jaw-dropping mayhem we've seen the team in yet. It's easy to forgive a boring plot when everything that is going on around it is so damn fun and ridiculous.
One of the other slightly awkward jobs this movie found itself having to do was retconning, the paths they take the story and its characters down force the movie to delete and rewrite some franchise history. This mostly pertains to the Hobbs/Deckard relationship which is sure to be the most talked about aspect of this film. Especially because, at times, this movie feels like it has way more focus on these two guys than it does Dom, it feels like an attempt to maybe find a new Brian to help keep the series going.
The team dynamic is what holds this film together, without the long-established chemistry of the gang this movie could have easily fallen flat. I have faith that these men and women could carry just about any story they want just with their charm and charisma. Any time Ludacris and Tyrese share the screen magic is happening and a giant smile is plastered on your face. Couple this with some choice cameos throughout and you have a Fast movie that hits all the major buttons fans are looking for.
It's not just more of the same, though. Continuing to build on the franchise F8 dives deep down a rabbit hole of absurdity in its action and execution. As with all of these films, there are moments where you have to pick your jaw up off the floor because you can't believe they did what they just did. Moments like when a giant wrecking ball takes out a small army of vehicles chasing them on their most recent job, or Tyrese driving a bright orange Lamborghini across a frozen body of water. It's all meant to make you go "holy shit" and have the best possible time doing so, in this sense the film totally succeeds.
Though F8 does well in the absence of Paul Walker they still have major changes to make if they want to keep going from here. They may have done a fine job distracting us from focusing on the fact that he wasn't there, but it isn't enough to keep it going through multiple other films. They need to find someone to, in a way, replace the role the character of Brian played in this series. Dom can't be the heart and soul of the team, he's just the hard-edged fearless leader. This all just makes the ninth movie that much more interesting, if they can pull this transition off there is no telling how long this will continue on for.
It's crazy to see how these movies have grown over the past sixteen years. It's a franchise like none we have seen before and it continues to find ways to stand out amongst the ever-growing crowd of action blockbusters. Though The Fate of the Furious decides to show us what happens when it's broken, this is still a "family" film through and through. It may not have everything needed to please the fans who hopped on after Fast Five, but it's got all the ingredients needed to make any long-time fan go wild.
As always, thanks for reading and I am Zach Who Watches Movies. You can find me anytime on twitter @ZachWWMovies, smell ya later!
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