Movie Review: Furious 7

James Wan (The Conjuring) takes the wheel for the latest in the Fast & Furious series, Furious 7.

Brian, Dom, Letty, and the rest of the crew are back.  After taking care of Owen Shaw in Fast & Furious 6, the crew is trying to settle down and keep it low key for a while.  Well, little did anyone know, Owen had an older brother who is quite protective of him and wants revenge.  Deckard Shaw (Jason Statham, The Transporter) is furious (see what I did there) about what happened to his little brother and decides to take out revenge by trying to kill off our beloved band of misfits one by one.  This revenge plot seems to be where the film is leading, until we take a sharp left turn into crazy town.  Deckard is ex-military and has pretty much become a ghost, so the crew doesn't know where he is or when he'll strike.  They're pretty defenseless.  Enter another ghost, who's actually currently in the military.  Mr. Nobody (Kurt Russell, The Thing), is a government agent who is trying to rescue a kidnapped hacker named Ramsey (Nathalie Emmanuel).  She's created a program called God's Eye which can hack into any and all electronic devices in the world with a camera or microphone.  Perfect for locating the ever elusive Deckard.  Because for some reason the military is not capable of doing this themselves (?), Mr. Nobody seeks out the aid of the F& F crew to help retrieve Ramsey and her program.  In return, he will let them use the God's Eye to find Deckard.  This leads to traveling the world, dropping cars from planes, crashing through the air between skyscrapers, and finally an all out war between the crew, the kidnapper (Djimon Hounsou, Guardians of the Galaxy), and Deckard that pretty much levels half of LA.

If you've seen the rest of the Fast & Furious series, I'm going to guess you've already decided whether you're going to see this or not regardless of this review.  If you haven't seen the rest of the series, I recommend it for some good adrenaline pumping fun.  There's a couple misfires in there, but for the most part it's a good time that just progressively gets better.  When the series started, it could get a little ridiculous, but still managed to stay low key.  By the time six rolled around, they were driving a tank down the interstate and holding a cargo plane down with a group of sports cars.  If you're more inclined towards the craziness of the last two films, then this one will not disappoint.  It takes all the crazy from 5 and 6 and throws in a couple kitchen sinks.

Furious 7 almost goes too far with the insanity.....almost.  It ends up giving just the right amount.  Does most of it seem completely implausible? Hell yes.  Do you enjoy every last second of the action anyway?  Hell yes.  The God's Eye storyline is a bit much, but you just have to accept it because it is the catalyst for all the crazy stunts they do with the cars.  This is James Wan's first crack at this series (and only his second non-horror feature), and I think he does a fine job with it.  There are a few lengthy fight scenes because Jason Statham and Ronda Rousey are in it.  They all seemed fairly well filmed and choreographed.  Also, tension is a big part of both action and horror, but in different ways.  Wan has now proven he can do both.  Most of the stunts are utterly ridiculous, but Wan does so well with developing tension that I found myself forgetting that and sitting on the edge my seat wondering if they were gonna make it.  This was the longest movie in the franchise and yet there were very few gaps in the action, so it felt like the quickest.

The actors in this film are a big part of what makes it work as well.  There is definitely some talent in there, but I wouldn't go out and say they are all great actors.  What they do have though is genuine chemistry.  Most of them have been doing this since the first couple of films, and it shows.  Even when the dialogue is hokey, they all seem to genuinely be having a good time just hanging out with each other, and that makes it work.  As for the newcomers, I didn't think Ramsey brought much to the table.  She felt like a third wheel since she was a hacker and they already have Tej for that role.  Jason Statham was a lot of fun as a kick-ass bad guy.  The best newcomer would be Mr. Nobody though.  He and Dom played off of each other well.  I'd really like to see him return in any future installments (which you know there will be), since, sadly, Paul Walker is no longer with us.  As for Walker, he was never bad, but he was also never the greatest actor in the world.  What he did have though, was charisma and just a naturally likeable personality that came through in his performances.  He'll be missed, and I think he left us on a high note with his performance in this film.  Without spoiling anything, I'll just say that they also give him a touching send-off at the end of the film that just felt perfect.

The story and the stunts are both absurd, but you just can't help enjoying yourself at this movie.  Between this and Kingsman: The Secret Service, the popcorn-poppin' action flicks have been a whole lot of fun so far this year.  I'm ready for the summer blockbusters.

Rating: ********-- (8 out of 10) [matinee]

Memorable Quote:

Dom: This time it ain't just about being fast.

Movie Review: Guardians of the Galaxy

James Gunn (Slither) helmed this next installment in the Marvel Cinematic Universe, Guardians of the Galaxy, and it's another great success in my opinion.

The general audience may not know who the Guardians are, but watching this film they'll definitely be hooked on a feeling of complete joy.  The film starts off in 1988 with a small boy named Peter Quill.  After seeing his mother pass away, he runs off and is abducted by a spaceship.  Cut to present day and we find an adult Peter, played by Chris Pratt (The Lego Movie), hunting down this small orb for a buyer.  We find that in the last 26 years he has been raised and trained by a group of ravagers, essentially space pirates.  He tries to sell it on Xandar, the homeworld of the Nova Corp.  It turns out to be a powerful weapon that the Nova's enemies, the Kree, want to steal for themselves to destroy Xandar.  From there it becomes a fun romp through space with Quill (or as he likes to call himself, Star Lord), and the unlikely group of heroes he accumulates, fighting the good fight to save Xandar and the Nova Corp.

It's a pretty basic plot, but the real fun of the movie comes from getting to know the characters.  Peter Quill is a wise-ass womanizing space pirate.  Drax the Destroyer (Dave Bautista, Riddick) is the literal-minded, muscle-bound alien hell-bent on getting revenge on the Kree.  Gamora (Zoe Saldana, Star Trek), is the "daughter" of the Kree leader, Thanos, whom she incidentally hates.  Then there is the walking tree named Groot (Vin Diesel, Boiler Room) and his little partner Rocket (Bradley Cooper, Limitless), the space-raccoon (although don't call him that to his face) with an attitude.  This group doesn't even like each other to begin with, so the bickering just makes for a fun time as they get to know each other and start to realize that they need to work together.  The role of Quill seems like it was written just for Pratt.  I think it may be the best bit of Marvel casting since RDJ as Tony Stark.  Not knowing the characters ahead of time, I don't know if the part was adapted to him or if that really is the way the character is.  Either way, it was just a ton of fun to watch.  The others did just as well, especially Diesel who did voice-over for the CGI Groot and could only use a vocabulary of three words to get his point across by using different inflections of his voice.  There was also a lot of greatness in the supporting cast with the likes of Glenn Close, John C. Reilly, and Michael Rooker.  One of the standouts, however, was Lee Pace (Lincoln).  He played Ronan, the leader of the Kree army that was after the orb.  He dove so far into the role of the power hungry alien that I didn't even realize it was him until the credits rolled.

Besides the top-notch cast, this film has a lot else going for it.  There's a little something in it for everyone.  The dialog is one of the best things going for it.  This movie had me laughing throughout most of it.  The dialog was just really witty and sharp.  I am a huge fan of 80's movies and this film managed to work in a lot of 80's dialog and references.  It was not shoehorned in either.  It all made sense within the context of the film, since Peter Quill was abducted from earth in 1988.  That would mean all knowledge of Earth for him only goes up to the 80's.  In keeping with this trend, it also had the feel of an 80's action/adventure/comedy.  It's hard to describe.  It was like watching an old Indiana Jones, mixed with a little Ghostbusters, set in space.  I don't mean similar subject matter, but rather tone and feel.  Also, without shoehorning it in, but rather flowing it into the narrative, this film may have the best soundtrack since Almost Famous.  It has a soundtrack that just makes you want to get up and dance.  In fact, there's even some fun dance scenes in here that also seem like they have no place in film like this, but somehow work oh so well.

Well, after this whole love-fest for this fantastic movie, I do have to point out one or two minor things that did not work for me.  First, I was worried in the beginning about the dialog.  These are characters that, as I've said, the general public are not even going to know the names of.  Therefore, that's the one thing they did have to shoehorn in.  I thought the dialog when introducing a couple of the characters was a little hokey.  You'll give this a pass, once you realize that it is only to get the introductions out of the way, which is necessary.  The other thing is, I did not like the camera work for the heavy action scenes.  When there was too much action going on, the camera was all over the place.  It was also full of fast cuts.  Luckily there were not a lot of scenes like this, and when there was a little less heavy action it was perfectly acceptable.  It just seemed like when there was too much going on at one time the director and cameraman didn't know where they should be, so they tried to be everywhere at once.

Other than those small complaints, I highly recommend you go out and see this film.  It doesn't matter if you know these characters or not going in.  By the time you leave, you'll be hungry for more.  And in true 80's fashion they let you know you'll get more with the pre-credits title card telling you "Guardians of the Galaxy will be back".  Also, being a Marvel movie, there is a stinger after the credits.  I will tell you that it does not progress any storyline, but for anyone in their mid-30's like me, there's a fairly unexpected fun little cameo.  This movie has it all, action, adventure, comedy, dancing, and a killer soundtrack.  If you're looking for a fun time at the movies, this is your ticket.

Rating: *********- (9 out of 10)

Memorable Quote:

Gamora: We're just like Kevin Bacon!