I’ve finally made it all the way to the 5th film in the series. Fast & Furious 5 as it was called in the Uk, Fast Five elsewhere.
This one was again a little different to the previous four films. Rather than focusing on the street racing they chose to head in a slightly more ocean’s eleven style direction and the drivers had to pull of a heist. The safe of Rio’s dodgiest criminal. They started the film in the same exact moment the previous left off, rescuing Dom from the security bus driving him to his high security prison, making this film set before the third one. This allowed them to bring Han in as well as many of the other favourites in the franchise.
While there weren’t as many car chase scenes there was still plenty of action with a car heist from a moving train, the group being pursued by the DSS cop, Hobbs, played by Dwayne Johnson, and the final big heist of the safe itself. There was also a very large amount of shooting and on foot chasing compared to the previous films, but this was not a bad thing.
My favourite scenes were by far the ones with both Dom and Hobbs, two highly testosterone filled men on opposite sides of the law, and boy were their scenes deliciously tense. I don’t normally like Johnson’s films as he hasn’t quite lost the Rock image in my head, but here it played to his advantage. If anyone was going to appear as a threat to our Dominic Torreto it was an ex-bounty hunter, turned criminal investigator for the government, who had subconscious wrestler thoughts to draw on.
Dom was also on top form showing off all three of his best qualities. Tough protective guy, sensitive and caring towards the female cop who had lost her husband to crime and an incredibly smart planner to not only pull of the heist but trick several of his adversaries into thinking he hadn’t until everything was safely out of their reach.
I found this film was also funnier than the previous four. The larger group allowed for more light relief moments with gags and sillyness. While this withdrew from the tension of the film I think it added more than it took away. That ‘team working together’ feel that was in the first one was back with full force and I was sad to see everyone go their separate ways at the end, though some of those moments were funny too.
They found a better balance in this film and I think it now appeals to a much larger market than the previous ones in the franchise did. It should be an easy like for people that enjoy action and Ocean’s eleven type films.
I also want to recommend watching until after the credits as they put in a sneaky peak at a possible plot line for the next one and it’s quite an interesting bit.
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