Fast Five

There are some franchises which suck you in and you could not, even if your life was dependant upon it, offer up a respectable reason as to why you are on board with this particular turbo charged bandwagon.

I blame clever release dates aka there was fuck all else out. It is the only viable explanation as to why this is the third instalment of the Fast and Furious saga that The Nerdy Trio have been to see on opening weekend.

PLOT: Fast 5 opens exactly where Fast 4 finishes. I realised this in the cinema and subsequently I died a little shortly thereafter. Dom (Vin Diesel) Brian (Paul Walker) and Mia (Jordana Brewster) are on the run in Rio where they chance upon a micro chip that leads them on an adventure whereupon they stand to steal $100,000,000.00. Agent Hobbs (Dwyane Johnson) and various local criminals are unhappy about this. There is a car chase. There is a nice little “get the gang back together montage” and before The Rock can scream “BRING IT!” the explosions start. There is a fight scene between two big bald headed lumbering juggernauts of manly testosterone. Paul Walker has very blue eyes. Diesel and The Rock stare so intently at one another I thought I saw a brief glimmer of man love. There are cool cars. They get the money. Down town Brazil is destroyed forever. END PLOT

The plot is irrelevant but allows us to have some minor car chases in order to build up to the big finale which is as ridiculous as it is awesome.

Paul Walker is a very bad actor who has struck it lucky as all these movies require him to do is to smile and look attractive until the stunt double is ready to take over.

Vin Diesel cannot be considered an actor as he always come across as some sort of doughy mechanical retard whose batteries are in dire need of changing. The Rock just plays The Rock and even then I think he is always slightly miscast. It is only a matter of time before these two play brothers in the LOUDEST (but mostly dialogue free) action film of all time.

If The Rock had taken up the offer of a hug this would have been a totally different movie

The supporting cast through are quite fun. I think that Ludicrous has this wonderfully dry delivery (either that or I am giving him way too much credit) and although saddled with some god awful lines Tyrese Gibson is charming. These two were fun together.

I am not even embarrassed to admit that there was always something cool about the character of Han. I am glad that we are forgetting that he actually died in Tokyo Drift in order to keep the character around - either that or the Fast & Furious movies are trying to mind fuck us all with a complicated time line of events.

In action franchises each instalment gets bigger and louder with each passing movie and Fast 5 is no different and to be honest I am grateful. I could sit here and type out a list of faults in the movie, the fact that it is totally unrealistic and of course the bad acting but what would be the point? If you are wanting a thought provoking critique on the modern failings of society then you have walked into the wrong screen.

Fast 5 is a classic leave you brain at the door and enjoy the noise, pretty cars and explosions kind of film. It gets an 8/10 for the cinema experience - I will never see a Fast and Furious movie outside of the cinema