Preface

• First of all, shoutout to my local movie theater who put four great trailers before this movie.
  • Seriously, we had Avengers, Mission Impossible, Mad Max. Good job, my local theater.

Suspension of Disbelief

• Alright, before I even get into my formal review of this movie I gotta clear something up.
• This movie is not Dark Knight style realism, this not does not adapt the gritty realism of Casino Royale, this movie is completely wacky ridiculous.
• And it is ABSURD to say the least. And yeah, it’s really cheesy and has a lot of one-liners, but it’s Fast and the Furious SEVEN.
• That being said, this movie breaks all barriers on ridiculousness and if you like that crap, you’ll like this movie. If you hate that crap, you’ll hate this movie.
  • I was somewhere in between because I did enjoy this absurdity for the most part.

Premise

• So, uh… Does anyone know the plot of this thing?
• Something about an anti-organization led by Jason Statham that’s trying to take down the Fast crew. I’ve only seen Fast Five (and part of 6) before this guys, so cut me some slack….

Cast and Characters

• So Vin Diesel is in the movie as Dom Toretto, the leader of the gang.
  • Ad Vin Diesel works as the leader of the group, he has a very commanding nature to him and he’s a pretty legit action star.
  • Granted this is no Michael Keaton in Birdman, but for a fun popcorn flick, action film he works just fine.
• Then we have Paul Walker as Brian O’Conner and he served the film well, and I’m glad that this is Walker’s final performance because, frankly, he did well in the movie.
  • A lot better than a lot of the other actors actually.
  • And he has a good send-off at the end.
• Kurt Russell is in the movie too, and I did enjoy his character a lot, and I’m told that a couple of the planned sequels will rotate around his character, which would be cool.
• Other than those guys, all the other supporting members of the crew did a good job and whoa, whoa, whoa.
• Dwayne “The Rock” Johnson was in this movie and I’ll say this:
  • My overall perspective of the movie would have been better if he didn’t give some of the most terrible and most forced one-liners I’ve ever heard.
  • We’re talking Arnold in Expendables 3 bad.
• So that was a bit of an issue…

Direction

• One of my friends I was seeing this with noticed the same thing as me about 10 minutes into the movie: it was obvious a horror director did this movie.
• James Wan, director of Saw, Insidious, and The Conjuring brought us his first big-budget blockbuster and well, it was okay.
• The obvious thing we noticed was that he didn’t seem to have the keen eye of an action director like Justin Lin of J.J. Abrams.
• Plus it was probably all a little overwhelming going from a budget of, say, $5 million to a budget of, say, $250 million.
• I mean the guy did well for his first big-budget film but there were some shaky points and not everything felt as visible as it could have been.
• Also, the pacing was a bit off especially in the final act.
  • The first 2/3 of the movie was paced really well and had enough drama blended with humor blended with action, but the final act was a little too water board-ish with action and should have cut off a point.

Script

• And also, the movie felt like it was gonna end about 4 different times.
  • Oh here it’s gonna end with that cool threat!
  • No? It’s gonna end with the group shot!
  • No? It’s gonna end with– wait, is this still going?
• I mean the script was riddled with incoherencies but ultimately it had enough realism and was just cheesy enough for me to enjoy.
• I do think that this would have been a really solid end to the franchise too, but heh!
  • God knows this movie will make $800 million worldwide, and I’ll see ya’ll back here in 2 years for Fast 8.
  • My brother was watching some late night show with Vin Diesel as guest the other day, and apparently Groot says that they now have up to Fast 10 planned. Zoinks.

In Conclusion

• In Conclusion, I thought that Furious 7 was executed well despite some directorial scuffs.
• I liked the big stunts, the drama, the good character relationships, and Paul Walker’s performance.
• Ultimately, we weren’t trying to be Whiplash here, but Furious 7 was still a good time, and worth checking out.
  • If you can suspend your disbelief…

3/5

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So guys, those are my thoughts on Furious 7 and the official start of the Summer Movie Season!! What are your thoughts on this movie? Let me know in the comments down below, and as always, thanks for reading guys.