Angst aside I have been meaning to write about this particular series of films.
We're onto number five by this point I believe.
The Fast and the Furious
2Fast 2Furious
Tokyo Drift
Fast and Furious
(I don't know the new title...it has the Rock in it though)
Now I have a dislike towards these films, with the exception of the third one. I'll get more into why I actually like Tokyo Drift.
Now the main draw of these films is the fast cars, thrilling "races", and attractive women...and to some Vin Diesel being there.
My major problem has been these seem to be marketed and advertised (at least at first) as a fancy movie about tuned cars street racing. However, behind all the fancy paint jobs and unnecessary body work on these cars is an action movie with car chases.
So if you removed the fancy tuned cars you'd pretty much have the same movie. Speaking of the same movie after seeing the fourth movie in theaters I walked out and realized that it is pretty much the same as the first movie.
Paul Walker goes undercover to infiltrate this underground gang who happens to street race. I'm probably missing a few other elements but I just couldn't help but think about how similar these were.
They function well as popcorn flicks and I can see the appeal to the mass public. From that standpoint I have to respect the creators for going with such a formula.
Before I go on...I'm bitter at how they destroyed my favorite car, the Nissan Skyline GT-R R34, in the second and fourth movie. That is NOT okay by me.
But enough about those, let me explain why I like Tokyo Drift over the rest of them (though I can't speak for the newest one since I haven't seen that)
This movie focused more on actual street racing and didn't involve any undercover cop story or anything like that. It was about a teenager making his way in his new life in Japan and living out his love of street racing. Sure it had the mafia getting involved after awhile, but it still had racing in the forefront with the main character learning how to drift and race on the mountains of Japan.
I just liked the main character. He had a likable personality for me and eventually learned what kind of person he was by the end of the film.
The races themselves focused on actual driving talent instead of hitting sick jumps and using the NOS button and other bullshit from the other films. It just felt like a racing movie to me. I hope they make another film like that (doesn't have to be in the Fast and Furious franchise).
So my basic summary is my main gripe with this franchise is how they seem to want to make it about fast cars and racing it seems like they feature that to draw you in.
However! And I feel this is a big however. The previews I've seen for the newer movie don't seem to feature much street racing at all but just featuring car chases and other crap like that so maybe they've dropped the whole street racing angle of these movies. I don't plan to see the new movie, but maybe they proved me wrong on this one.
Just my thoughts. Nothing more.
