Fast Five

Fast Five is a direct sequel to Fast and Furious, the fourth film in the street racing The Fast and The Furious franchise.  The story this time revolves around what happens directly after Brian O’Connor (Paul Walker) frees longtime rival Dominic Toretto (Vin Diesel).  Dominic and Brian decide to take on a Rio kingpin who controls all of Rio’s money.  The men of the Fast and Furious crew decide that the only way to render this kingpin powerless is to steal all of his money and kill him.  Brian also learns a secret about his girlfriend Mia and that secret worried me throughout this entire film.  The only weak point of this film is that once Mia’s secret is exposed,  it is not utilized at all throughout the film.  The film spends most of its time planning and executing a planned heist of this dictator’s money.

Fast Five could have been an absolute disaster.  Fast Five was a sequel that pretty much got the green light as soon as the film grossed well in its opening two weeks.  Needless to say, I was worried.  Credit of this film’s success goes to Fast Five director Justin Lin and his capable screenwriter Chris Morgan.  This could have easily been the film that killed the entire franchise but instead this movie completely reinvigorated it by making it a heist film.  I love this film and to me it was the start of summer.  If you don’t like street racing watch the movie for the heist concept introduced in the film.  Vin Diesel and Paul Walker don’t give this film its power, for once the script does.  The actors play their roles well but it is the sense of community created by Chris Morgan who knows the franchise, that allows all of these characters to have chemistry and work as a well oiled machine.  Fast Five was a broken down 1960 Beetle that was pimped out to become Herbie the racing lovebug from Herbie Fully Loaded.  All is now right in the world of action racing cinema.  It’s good to have the band back together even if its only for the second time.  I’m sure this film and it’s franchise have plenty of gas in the tank and tricks in its arsenal.  My only regret is that their wasn’t a lot of racing sequences for which the series had its origins but I’m glad to see a different tactic taken this time round.  I’ll ride with this franchise till the end.