Review of Fast Five (2011) by Shiira — 07 Jun 2011

In chronicling the travails of the Brazilian underclass, "Fast Five" is no "Pixote", the Hector Babenco neo-realist classic about lost childhood, but at least it pays lip service to the poor, which is marginally better than an amoral filmmaker such as Michael Bay, whose infamous chase sequence involving Hummers laying waste to a Cuban hillside shantytown in "Bad Boys 2", makes almost no filmic reference to the impoverished people who reside there.

The human collateral damage caused by the SUVs goes unacknowledged by both the driver(Will Smith) and the passenger(Martin Lawrence), because a third-world citizen isn't the equivalent of a first-world one.

So even though the U.S. feds(led by Dwayne Johnson), in "Fast Five", chase Dominic Toretto and his friends through an honest-to-goodness favela, firing at will without any self-consciousness about nicking an innocent bystander, the exotic on-location set is not utilized merely as background for a standard Hollywood-style shootout.

On the lam from the law, Vince, last seen in "The Fast and the Furious", has been hiding out in the Rio slums for the past ten years, and during the interim, he marries a Brazilian local and fathers a child with her.

Likewise, since Canada is too easy, Dom, a recently escaped convict, joins his old childhood friend, along with ex-cop Brian O'Conner and Dom's sister Mia, who are also wanted for their part in the bus hijacking that frees the bald linchpin en route to a federal penitentiary.

Despite the fact that all the Portuguese-speaking parts are assigned to crooked cops and criminals, the filmmaker does attempt to put a human face on the favela inhabitants. When Rosa allows the fairer Toretto to put little Nico to sleep, both the mother and child are signified as people through Mia's Americanism.

By proxy, they're no longer just ordinary Brazilians. And then there's Elena, a neighborhood girl-turned-cop who, initially anyway, is seemingly the only honest law officer in all of Rio de Janerio. More interaction with the visiting fugitives would further distance the Rio locals from the same filmic life of faceless anonymity that confronts other third-world denizens whose respective countries serve as a backdrop for some crisis which often doesn't include them.

While "Fast Five" has just enough cultural sensitivity to stave off comparisons with a Michael Bay production, it still, however, bears the unmistakable stench of American imperialism. (For instance, the scene where the ersatz "Ocean's Eleven"-like outfit brazenly race in police cars.

) The filmmaker wants the moviegoer to care about Rosa, but not necessarily her countrymen. We never get to meet them. When Mia goes to an open market, her visit is cut short before she gets the chance to talk with a vendor, somebody other than Rosa who'd give the favela populace a collective identity.

Thanks to Vince, the ambushing of Mia, orchestrated by Reyes(the unofficial "governor" of Rio), goes awry, so the quota on Brazilian kidnappings, at least one a day according to the Jason Kohn documentary "Manda Bala(Send a Bullet)", gets left to some other Portuguese goon and his henchmen.

Contrary to Brazil's reputation as a glamorous tourist destination, the South American country with the seventh highest GDP is plagued by high crime rates, nefarious government officials, and a disproportionate amount of poor people.

In "Manda Bala", a frog farmer, who was thought to be involved in a money-laundering scheme with then-Governor Jader Barbalho, tells the camera proudly that he chose the frogs, after his wife issued him an ultimatum which put the small businessman's aquaculture business in opposition with their marriage.

The money was just too good. Love, both the brotherly and romantic kind, also takes a backseat in "Fast Five", as well, since Mia is allowed to go out alone, unescorted, without notice. Dominic and Brian are too busy mulling over their potential hundred-million dollar payday.

This cast of characters were a whole lot more likable when they were rebels without a cause, mere small-time crooks who'd boost semi trucks at great risk for the incommensurate payoff of DVD players in the Rob Cohen original.

By sequestering the thieves from the natives, the ugliness of their greed will go unnoticed by most moviegoers, who are conditioned to root for the good guys, or at the very least, the anti-heroes. Sure, they give Vince's widow a cut of the money, but that's a mere pittance in lieu of the innumerable poverty-stricken Brazilians who wallow in abject destitution.

It's one thing to steal from Americans on domestic soil, but it's a whole other thing to steal from the people of a developing country. "Fast Five" is a film of its time. This updating of Steven Soderbergh's "Ocean's Eleven" very much captures the zeitgeist of the post-economic collapse.

These criminals don't give a f*ck about who they steal from, as long as they get paid.