'Fast & Furious 8' - Review

★ ★ ★ ½ ☆

Fast & Furious 8 or, as I like to call it, Physics? Never heard of it!, opens with Dominic Toretto (Vin Diesel) racing a flaming car backwards down the busy streets of Cuba, and only becomes more bonkers from there. After this brief display of disregard for civilian life, Dom turns this callous attitude on his own family, betraying Hobbs (Dwayne Johnson), his wife Letty (Michelle Rodriguez) and the rest of the crew for reasons unknown. He’s allied with Cipher (Charlize Theron in dreadlocks that she just about gets away with), a God-like hacker who – despite her ability to unseat entire nations with the flick of a switch – needs Dom for one last job. His heartbroken team have no choice but to join forces with a young upshot agent played by Scott Eastwood (a desperate and failed attempt to fill the seat left by Paul Waker) and old enemy Deckard Shaw (Jason Statham) to bring their fallen leader to justice.

Yes, it’s all got a bit dark this time around. Or as dark as a film where Statham calls Johnson a wanker from behind bars can be, anyhow.  It’s the cars and calamity you’ve paid to see, and the film’s zealous delivery of conflagration and testosterone ensures you’re never distracted by the corny dialogue or questionable performances. For all the developments in digital technology the saga has grown into, the tools to make Vin Diesel emote anywhere in the realms between wry smile and concrete slab have not yet been invented.

Still, you’re not there to admire the cast's acting ability any more than they’re turning up to win Oscars: they’re here for the ride, and so are we. Want to see a six-way game of tug-of-war played with sports cars? They’ve got it. Fancy the sight of Tyrese Gibson ice-surfing on the severed door of a Lamborghini? Thought so. Ever wondered what happens when half of New York’s traffic piles down a single street? I’ll get the popcorn, shall I?

Everyone slides into their roles with the ease of slipping on well-worn shoes and the one-liners bounce around as harmlessly as their owner’s cars seem to do (although Gibson’s constant back-and-forth with the closest person/object/explosion is beginning to grate). Of course, it all starts to fall apart once anyone starts talking for longer than it takes for several showrooms worth of cars to blow up, but I’m willing to forgive Chris Morgan’s script purely because it gifts us the sight and sound of Dame Helen Mirren shouting “Devil’s bumhole”.

The exotic locales and apparently uncontested damage to property is highly reminiscent of the James Bond series and – while it’s more Die Another Day than Casino Royale – Fast & Furious is well on the way to overtaking the British spy franchise in terms of instalments, box office heft and pure brainless enjoyment. Its complete self-awareness, total aversion to any façade of prestige and willingness to embrace the modern blockbuster landscape is a winning formula.  I’ve even been moderately enthused by the series’ strive for diversity, but it needs to drop the needless ogling of women’s backsides before I embrace it wholeheartedly.

It’s honestly astonishing to see just how far a franchise that began as Point Break with street-racing has become. The original film’s grimy aesthetic and plucky band of believable characters now seems ludicrously understated compared to Fast 8, which involves set pieces where around 100 cars drop from the sky and Diesel attempts to outwit a heat-seeking missile. At this point I’m tempted to slam the brakes and take a moment to wonder how much further they can possibly go with this, but we’ve all been here before and know the answer: a lot. Fast & Furious (Deep Space) 9, anyone?