Talkie Tuesday: Furious 7

Hello everyone!

This week, it's back to the movies, and what movie has EVERYBODY talking right now? No, it's not Fifty Shades of Grey anymore, and it's not a Nicholas Sparks adaptation or a swansong to a Tolkien-inspired era.  

This week, it's ALL about bald (or nearly bald) muscled people, blue-eyed actors who can make you sob, scantily-clad women, Abu Dhabi ... and fast cars.

Yes, I'm absolutely, definitely talking about 'Furious 7'.

The seventh installment in the Fast and Furious franchise roared into cinemas worldwide on April 3rd, whereas we here in Slovenia were actually (surprisingly) able to see it a day early, on the second of that month. I didn't get to see the premiere, but my girls and I hopped along for the ride this past Saturday with probably everyone within reasonable (and maybe slightly less reasonable) driving distance from the cinema, considering every showing seemed to be sold out!

And yes, four girls can and WILL have a good time watching a movie about cars!

The seventh film kicks off where movies six and three ended (I'm not exactly sure how this was planned, but anyway, Tokyo Drift is, chronologically, movie 6.5 in the franchise, and not the third if you want to understand the stories correctly): Owen Shaw has been defeated and put in a coma, Han is dead by the hand of Deckard Shaw, the 'big bad brother', as Hobbs aptly puts it. And now? Now Shaw Sr. wants complete revenge, and is coming for Dom's family, no less with a bomb sent directly from Tokyo to eradicate the Torreto family home. This is where the movie takes off on a wild race as Dom & co deal with the new threat to their loved ones, with appearances from A-listers like Kurt Russell, who gives the story some more substance: find me a computer program that can find you anywhere in the world, and I'll get you Shaw. Deal? Deal. And we're officially off, not for the program, but the hacker who wrote it, adding another female character into the mix, and then continuing on the road across the globe back to LA to the good guys vs. bad guys fight. And since the movie is still playing, that's all I'll say on the matter.

This movie had a lot of story so I'm going to break it down into points which I think emphasize the messages that were carried across the most.

Let's begin with the movie's biggest and baddest: Jason Statham. A warning to any reader out there, I'm a big fan of this guy. He's going on fifty years of age and can literally whoop your behind with his eyes closed, one hand tied behind his back, only two functional fingers on the other, and hanging upside down. Not even kidding. He has black belt on black belt in about three different fighting styles, I believe he also used to race, and he insists on performing his own stunts. So, next time you see this movie and watch him kick it, please remember no harm was done to the Brit, but no one can be so sure about the other stunt guys involved ... ahem. When I saw him in the mid-credit scene during movie six, I swear I squealed like a banshee. And he did not disappoint in this movie at all. Statham epic moment of the hour: eating dinner and enjoying a glass of wine while a dozen special forces members point their guns at him.

Next, we move on to Hobbs, aka Dwayne Johnson, aka The Rock. Because, seriously, the man is a beast. I haven't seen that many of his movies so far, but I'm amused how he looks normal back in Scorpion King, and then you bam into GI Joe or Fast and Furious, and he's a tank. Actually, I think the poor tanks might be out of a job ... Hobbs is a bit left out in this one as he gets into a fight with Shaw (epicness between Rock and Statham, though) and gets exploded out of a building (yes, for real), breaking bones. But towards the end, during the ultimate showdown on the streets of LA, he sees the news and a burning tower, breaks his own cast off, says 'Daddy's gotta go to work', and promptly steals an ambulance to drive it off a bridge into a military drone. Of course, the man himself is intact and breaks out - the poor drone kicked it though - proceeds to explain to Letty that 'he IS the cavalry', grabs a machine gun, and goes off in search of things to shoot. I mean, how can you NOT like this guy?
                          

Farther down the list as we move along we have Roman. Or basically, Roman's interaction with the entire crew, because ... the man is a doofus. His 'what Roman does best' is basically sweet-talk his way out of any kind of situation he's in. If you think it can't be done, you're wrong, this man can prove it so. Not to mention, his reaction at getting parachuted out of a plane is priceless.

The movie would be nothing without Dom, of course ... and then there's his Letty. As Ramsey (the hacker, aka) puts it: the Alpha and Lady Alpha. Sad bit? Letty still hasn't regained her memory, but she does get flashes ... and she walks away from Vin freaking Diesel to get herself back. I mean, no offense, but giiiiiiiirl, what you thinking??? She's back on the crew later though and the love story for these two is soft, quiet, out of the way, until that kick in the butt we get in the end when she says they got married. Wait, come again? That's right, they're MARRIED people. Dom, you did it right. You really did.

Then it's the O'Connor family ... except wait, are Brian and Mia even married? I honestly can't remember. Obviously, they have a kid though, and another on the way, and they're just ridiculously sweet. I would have loved seeing more of Mia like in movie five, but I suppose it makes sense that she's safe and sound, far from danger. The phone conversation during which she tells Brian of the second pregnancy was to die for perfect. The beach scene? Don't get me started on emotions.

We're now moving out of the personna thing and into the things thing (yes, that's lame wording), since we're going into the humour section. I mean, no movie in this series would ever be half as good if it weren't for those witty lines. Roman isn't the only one who gets them, Tej is a jewel all for himself, and then there were almost Looney Tunes moments in this movie that had me cackling like a maniac. 'Too slow!' anyone? Or, a more morbid kind of humour, 'What're you gonna do when you find him? - Words haven't even been invented yet.' You gotta love the deadpan set when Vin delivers this line. Plus, comedic relief is necessary in a movie where you'd otherwise have only GO GO GO SHOOT GO GO DRIVE GO GO WAIT WHAT GO GO GO.

As we've already started talking about what the movie is without humour, let's continue and just say it's one huge action stunt sequence. From racing in cars, to crawling out of a bus which hangs over a cliff, to driving OFF a cliff, jumping through three skyscrapers in Abu Dhabi (yes, in a car, driving, a priceless car at that ...), to tossing a person between cars, this is probably the biggest of the movies yet. Roman has a very good monologue on this one: disguising as a cop? Shooting down a Russian plane? No problem. Jumping OUT of a plane with a car? Hell to the no (and then he does it anyway). There's a lot of action, but it's entertaining and fun, and really, it's a Fast and Furious movie ... what did you expect?

Still ... that being said, we have to touch on the laws of physics a little bit. Or, in this case, the lack of them. It's not that it's a bad thing - as said before, in these movies? Nah, don't think about it - but sometimes it was quite glaringly obvious that it wasn't there. Entertainment value though? Priceless.

Fighting and duelling? Got it covered in this one, multiple times, and Jason Statham is in every one of those. Everybody cheers! 

And then we get to the end ... and the tribute part. Obviously, this movie was a sad thing to watch because of what had unfortunately happened to Paul, but the tribute at the end was amazing and a beautiful send-off. It's probably a scene that had to be like this to be just right, otherwise it wouldn't have worked. The family on the beach, the shots of the other members as they watch on, the racing cars going separate directions ... and, of course, the monologue over it all, which wasn't so much Dom saying goodbye to Brian as it was Vin saying goodbye to Paul. The job was well done, the movie turned out spectacular, and the man himself would be so proud.

Source

After all - it was for Paul.

xx

*none of the images are mine