Fast Five

Fast Five attempts to revitalize the series

Fast Five (extended cut)

After Fast & Furious, it seemed like this series finally came to the end of the road. But the real racing here is how fast they can pump these movies out. At this rate they're set to overtake the number of Friday the 13th films by 2020.

Fast Five is widely acknowledged to be the film that revitalized the franchise, and its the one most frequently cited as the best in the series. Which is strange given that it has the exact same plot as 2 Fast 2 Furious, and Fast & Furious, the two most reviled entries in the series.

Once again, for the third time in five movies they take on a drug kingpin, with a bit of personal revenge mixed in. The tired plot is helped by over-the-top action sequences, and the introduction of Dwayne "The Rock" Johnson to the cast.

The trouble is the over-the-top action scenes go way over the top, pushing the believability of not just what people can do, but what cars can do too. Let's face it, in the real world if you hit too big a pothole you'll break an axle, yet in the opening scene a fully loaded bus rolls over the top of a car a car and not only is the driver, Brian (Paul Walker) not crushed to death, he and the car emerge completely unscratched. And that's nothing compared to what the cars driven by Toretto and Brian do in the last big action scene.

And while The Rock isn't here for his acting skills, his role as a Diplomatic Security Service Agent also lacks credibility. Honestly, compared to his performance in similar roles like Central Intelligence, The Other Guys, etc. he really seems more wooden than hammy here - particularly in a scene where he's grieving/angry over the loss of comrades.

All of this wouldn't be so bad if the film didn't fall down on all three of the series cornerstones: music, babes, and car races. The music here is pretty generic, with only a couple (also generic) salsa tracks breaking up the monotony. There are very few scenes with the classic girls in short shorts, although one plot point actually requires Gal Gadot to show off her flat booty in a bikini - so there's that. But worst of all, there's almost no street racing. While there's plenty of car chase action sequences, there's only one race scene where the guys race some stolen cop cars. Another race scene for titles is part of the plot, but the actual race happens off-screen, and we just see the results by who is driving what car.

The movie culminates in a chase sequence in downtown Rio de Janiero that stretches credibility, even for Fast and Furious films, with enough danger to innocents and other collateral damage that it makes the drug dealer look like the good guy.

The extended cut is about 1 minute longer than the theatrical cut, but is made up of barely noticeable seconds of shots here and there throughout the film.

The Good:

• The Rock is in it

The Bad:

• the acting is generally weak all around
• skimps on the basic ingredients that made the franchise successful
• not exactly the fastest Fast film, at over 2 hours runtime
• stretches credibility

The Verdict:
**1/2 out of *****