It’s difficult to imagine a Fast and Furious film without the late Paul Walker, whose character, Brian O’Connor, was the heart which held the fictional team together. Yet, the franchise manages to drive on in his honour with an eight film, aptly titled The Fate of the Furious, also referred to as Fast 8.
The film is the first in the series without Walker, who sadly passed away in a tragic car accident in 2013. After his final film, Furious 7, it is assumed that his character has gone on to live a happy life with his wife, Mia Torretto (Jordana Brewster) and child. Thus, in Fast 8, we see the team carry on with their technically illegal heroics sans Brian and Mia.
Fast 8 essentially follows the same formula as the other Fast and Furious films, however, with age comes maturity and the series ‘grows up’ from its boy-racing, street cop days to international espionage, cyber-sleuthing, modern weaponry and upgraded vehicles.
Typical of the past couple of films, Fast 8 begins with a good old fashioned friendly car race, this time set in the beautiful city of Havana, Cuba. We are shown a glimpse of the happily ever after life of Dom (Vin Diesel) and Letty (Michelle Rodriguez) as they enjoy their honeymoon surrounded by Cuban culture. The scene is perfect, almost too perfect, as it depicts Dom as being, once again, the best driver who, despite the greatest odds, manages to win every race.
It’s almost predictable, this early in the film, for something to go awry and in-keeping with the series’ formula, it does, though this time with Dom, himself, going rogue. Dom’s ‘team’ of trusted friends, or rather, those he considers as family, are brought in to remove the threat and ‘save’ Dom. Usually, this summoning involves character by character introduction. This time around, the film opts to instead include humour, culture and highlight Dwayne ‘The Rock’ Johnson’s massive arms. Whilst different, Johnson’s inclusion of the ‘haka’, a traditional war cry of the Maori people from New Zealand, is a welcome addition and highlights the actor’s Polynesian heritage.
Johnson’s role within the franchise is clearly growing as his character plays much more of a leadership position of Dom’s team in Fast 8. The obvious ‘hate-hate’ relationship and one-upmanship between Johnson’s character and Deckard Shaw (Jason Statham) is funny and well worth the watch on screen.
While humour does play more of a part in Fast 8 compared to previous films, the core of good guys vs bad guys remains, though with plenty more gadgetry and advanced technology. Fast 8 actually caught my interest more so than previous films in terms of the cyber-technology used and the theme of hacking into anything and everything. One of my favourite themes currently is the notion of the dangers of technology and the immense threat it could be should it fall into the wrong hands. This was clearly illustrated in the film with Charlize Theron, playing the villainous hacker, Cypher, no doubt being one of the most challenging adversaries the team has ever gone up against. Theron clearly was made to play the part of the villain, as she pulls off the role masterfully, in such a way that even I, as a viewer, wanted to thwart her world domination plans.
As with all films of its kind, Fast 8 certainly made use of international locations more so than its previous films, with scenes being set in multiple countries and locations. It was especially refreshing to witness car chases occur in New York City, one of the busiest cities in the world. However, while car chases were included in the film, the aspect of high-octane racing and challenging drivers appeared lost. That didn’t really appear to have affected the film though, as each moment was gratifying in terms of adrenaline and action.
As a two hour film, filled with a reasonable plot, decent action and fairly cool looking vehicles, it’s almost safe to say that the Fast and Furious franchise is one that will continue to thrive, however, only if the novelty remains. One way in which the film appeared to be different was to significantly decrease the number of ‘hot girls’ in the film, which to me, isn’t a bad thing. However, the one change which I wasn’t a fan of was the inclusion of Scott Estwood, a.k.a the rookie, to the team and series as a whole. His inclusion appeared to set him up as a replacement for Paul Walker and could potentially lead to him taking the lead in future films. Whilst the idea of having a rookie train in the ‘ways’ of the Toretto family is somewhat appealing, I would much rather a completely new franchise.
Visually, there isn’t anything new to praise. While the cityscape of New York looked great and the cultured streets of Havana was filled with colour, there didn’t appear to be anything novel in terms of graphics and visuals. Similarly the same with soundtrack as adrenaline filled scenes were rife with the same kind of soundtrack as the previous films with nothing seemingly original. Perhaps the minds behind Fast 8 wanted to stick with what they knew worked? This neither put me off the film nor caught my attention so perhaps this isn’t necessarily a bad thing. Just bland.
As a whole, the film is much of the same and is entertaining, especially to those who enjoy a rather mindless action film. With humorous moments and some special cameos, Fast 8 is a decent watch and will appeal to those wanting a little dose of Johnson against Statham, action and seriously cool technology. Just don’t expect anything new and exciting, and know that Tyrese Gibson’s character, Roman, is still as annoying as ever.