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Let me first admit that I’m ill equipped to review this movie. For starters I drive a Sentra. The paint’s faded and the windows don’t all roll down. The CD player stopped working eons ago. No spoiler can be found on its trunk. Second, I use my turn signal, a sad little character that is underused in the entire series. I railed against the previous Furious movies, including that festering neon distraction called Tokyo Drift. Despite my protests — ha! — sequels were made and here we are today.
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We’re talking Star Wars here, which I’ll admit is a tangent, but it’s a useful jumping-off point to the keystone of Fast & Furious’ foolishness. Regard it as less of a modern-day action flick and more like a science fiction yarn, the nuts and bolts variety, and it becomes instantly more tolerable … likeable even. Notice, for instance, the first scene with hot rodders hijacking fuel from a big rig hauling a train of tankers. Some standard accessories: people hanging from hoods, fenders are dented, tires are blown out with shotguns. The explosions come at the end as a burning tanker bounces down the highway leaving fiery windows of opportunity for an elite driver to escape. And here’s a film with no shortage of elite drivers. Of course this is all implausible on a level so absurd that describing it would sterilize a generation. But ignore all the noise and what do you get? It’s a vehicular melodrama, a rock-infused opera to the pavement, a cross-section of America’s brazen infatuation with the automobile. I didn’t like the movie, but I respect its dedication to its subject.
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O’Connor and Toretto — which sounds like a Carter-era muscle car: 1977 Dodge Torette with racing tires and candy-apple red paint — are working opposite ends of an investigation into a Mexican drug dealer who uses high-end cars and experienced street racers to bring heroine into the United States. The drug dealer uses an underground tunnel through a mountain along the U.S.-Mexico border. Nevermind that low-key minivans and non-descript sedans — as opposed to pimped-out Chevelles and M3s with new paint jobs — traffic drugs into this country every day. And nevermind that the drug dealer auditions his drivers on crowded Los Angeles streets while the actual trafficking route is basically a straight shot through the mountain. It’s like trying out for basketball to get on the football team, but whatever.
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I’m not entirely sure that the makers of Fast & Furious have ever seen a car chase on film before. I think they’ve just read the lists that include top chase films, and they vaguely recollect that they usually include Bullitt, although they’re not sure why. They fail to recognize that most car chases involve ugly cars, beaters that are a fan belt away from the scrap heap. That’s part of the appeal: a character pushing himself, and his vehicle, to the very breaking point. The Blues Brothers sustained an entire film in a 1974 Dodge Monaco. Gene Hackman stole a 1971 Pontiac LeMans to chase down (or is it up?) an elevated train in The French Connection. Even the visceral Ronin, a personal favorite, used smallish European autos of no discernible strength or beauty to chase through those tiny foreign streets.
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The chases just don’t have that sparkle to them. They just kinda exist, like that lamp in your living room that you couldn’t describe in any sort of detail even if you’ve had it for a decade. I’m reminded of Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade, where Indy went from zeppelin to biplane to car in a chase that’s ridiculous, yes, but also inventive and spontaneous. Most chase films understand the dynamic between the characters and the road, and then employ a metaphor (the chase is inevitable redemption, or escape) to drive the plot forward. Furious uses the chase because the plot, and the series’ genealogy, requires it. And it overuses the nitrous gimmick, where the press of a button blasts the cars forward like rocket ships.
And as proof that the Fast & Furious movies, this one included, don’t know a thing about car chases, answer this: When was the last time you saw one on a “best movie car chase” list?
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