Cinemazlowski Movie Review - "Fate of the Furious"

Apr 26, 2017

Some movies are intended to be ridiculous fun, and the "Fast and the Furious" series is a prime example of that principle. Packed with souped-up cars, exotic locations, lots of explosions and an ever-growing number of movie stars willing to grab a fat paycheck for having a blast, they're impossible to take seriously – yet audiences love them so much that the latest entry, "Fate of the Furious," is the eighth one.  

It's also the first full film in the series to be made without its original co-star Paul Walker, following his tragic death in an off-set car accident during the making of "Furious 7." While his absence removes some of the heart that gave the series' fans a strong attachment to the de facto "family" of street racers as they engaged in global escapades, "Fate" still has enough gas in the tank to make it a thrilling ride.

"Fate" shakes up the formula by putting the crew's leader, Dom (Vin Diesel), in a situation where he is forced to turn against his family and friends by a beautiful blonde super-hacker known as Cipher (Charlize Theron). Cipher has forced Dom's betrayal via a shocking revelation in a cellphone video that is left unseen by the audience.  

Meanwhile, federal agent Ray Hobbs (Dwayne Johnson) – who has been recruiting the gang for secret quasi-criminal missions over the past two films – is ordered by a mysterious higher-up to retrieve a stolen Electromagnetic Pulse device that's gone missing in Berlin. Though he gets our antiheroes onboard with the plan, things go south when Dom abruptly slams his car into Hobbs' truck amid their getaway from German police and then steals the EMP back from him on Cipher's behalf.

This betrayal of his friends goes against everything that Dom has always claimed to stand for, and soon we learn why. He discovers that he has an infant son by his former girlfriend Elena (Elisa Patasky), and he has to help Cipher steal the Russian nuclear missile codes from that country's defense minister amid a diplomatic motorcade in New York City if he wants to keep the child alive.

At the same time, Hobbs is hung out to dry by his own superiors, who allow him to go to prison for his part in the Berlin mayhem. He winds up next cell over from his nemesis, the rogue British Special Forces agent Deckard Shaw (Jason Statham), but both are busted out by covert ops kingpin Mr. Nobody (Kurt Russell) and forced to team up and stop Dom and Cipher.  

Thus begins a virtually non-stop series of car chases, explosions and shootings that have plenty of flash but even less logic than anything else in the entire series. In one sequence, Cipher has her minions override the computer chips in hundreds of cars before sending the unmanned vehicles crashing through the streets, despite the fact her goal is merely to stop the Russian defense minister and there is no plausible reason for that much mayhem.

But that's nothing compared to the climactic sequence, in which the gang and Hobbs wind up on a Russian military base in the Arctic, trying to stop a nuclear submarine from being remotely hijacked by Cipher. Little of it makes coherent sense, but director F. Gary Gray ("Straight Outta Compton") knows to keep things moving. He and writer Chris Morgan manage to create a hilarious rapport between Johnson and Statham, as the two rivals are forced to get along to save the planet.

Theron is the weakest link in the movie, merely spouting out threats and calling out orders to her underlings while standing around on board a private jet. That lack of a compelling villain somewhat hurts the effectiveness of this entry in the series, but amid the constant action and wisecracks, the movie still proves to be entertaining enough.

The "Furious" movies have always had a confused moral tone, asking viewers to root for a gang of criminals, even as they're now working in their own shadowy way for the U.S. government. This time around, the movie's endangerment of Elena and the baby initially creates a couple of truly disturbing moments that seem more exploitative than entertaining.

It's hard to take most of the violence seriously, the one sex scene is shadowed and between Dom and his wife Letty, and the foul language features one F word and about 20 other milder swears. And in the end, this is a crew that will do anything to save each other's' lives and ultimately do right to save the planet, and they always wind up with a serious moment of prayer as they gather for thanks before a meal. That kind of appreciation for faith is a quality that's all too rare, and evokes the underlying lovability that will keep the series going through the next two, final films in the works.