I must admit, this is not a franchise I have been following closely. I watched the original The Fast and the Furious in 2001 and thought it was good in the vein of Bad Boys or Rush Hour.
I must admit, this is not a franchise I have been following closely. I watched the original The Fast and the Furious in 2001 and thought it was good in the vein of Bad Boys or Rush Hour.
Somehow I missed 2 Fast 2 Furious (2003), The Fast and the Furious: Tokyo Drift (2006), Fast & Furious (2009) and Fast Five (2011), probably because I am not a teenage boy.
Luckily, I didn’t need to know much about the previous films in order to follow Fast & Furious 6. I have deduced that each film adds more ludicrous driving stunts, additional crew members and at some point Dwayne Johnson (aka. The Rock) was introduced as DSS Agent Hobbs.
The plot is simple enough—Dominic Toretto’s (Vin Diesel) crew are rich and happy, but not allowed to enter America due to their extensive criminal records. Agent Hobbs and his feisty new partner (the mixed martial artist Gina Carano who starred in Haywire) need Toretto’s crew to help take down a naughty British boy: ‘You need wolves to catch a wolf.’
They come to an arrangement whereby Toretto’s gang will help catch the Brit in exchange for immunity. Thrown into the mix is Letty Ortiz (Michelle Rodriguez), Toretto’s old girlfriend who supposedly died in a previous film.
However I preferred to follow the plot via Vin Diesel’s clothing: white vest, black vest, white vest, polo shirt, leather jacket (for chilly England), white vest. I haven’t seen that much brown, shiny muscle since my ill-founded trip to a Gay Bar in Birmingham. In fact, I suspect a budding romance between Vin Diesel and Dwayne Johnson but both are too overwhelmed by testosterone to declare their feelings.
Impressively the Fast & Furious hunks of man muscle are more than matched by the lady muscle, Gina Carano and Michelle Rodriguez. I enjoyed their fights more than anything the boys did.
I think it’s safe to say that the Fast & Furious franchise is not trying to win any Oscars, and certainly doesn’t require its stars to do anything more than speak and hit each other like planks of wood. Unfortunately the standard of action, even the car chases, never really rises above mediocrity. Perhaps each chapter of the series needs to add another layer of complexity to the ‘vehicular warfare’ so that by the 6th instalment we have airplanes, tanks, bridges, and cars that can flip over other cars. But ridiculous action scenes and dry acting can bring true enjoyment. Fast & Furious 6 is unintentionally/intentionally hilarious.
You will find unintentional hilarity for example, whenever Vin Diesel speaks. Within the first 5 minutes, he solemnly says to Paul Walker’s character: ‘Our old life is over,’ and the audience shrieked with laughter. At the end of the film, he offers an ex-girlfriend to ‘stick around’ whilst standing with the current girlfriend?! Is he suggesting threesomes or being polite? Only the scriptwriter knows.
Fast & Furious 6 does have intentional humour, Tyrese Gibson and Ludacris are fantastic, Gibson asks ‘why do I smell baby oil?’ just as Dwayne Johnson walks in. And the cherry on top of the terrible cake, the entrance of Jason Statham (even I cheered).
So if you want to turn your brain off and have a few drinks, see Fast & Furious 6. Don’t expect anything fast or furious, but I’m sure you will find it funny.
What do you think of Fast & Furious 6? Have your say in the comments section below, on Facebook or on Twitter.
