Review of Furious 7 (2015) by Elmarko44 — 12 Apr 2015

If nobody watches the Fast and Furious movies for the plot, why do they keep trying to put plot in these movies?

The attempts at establishing a character motivation story are nothing short of laughable. The dialogue that's supposed to tell my why I care about these characters, and why these characters care about whatever they're doing, wasn't much more than a string of cliches and one liners.

"The enemy of my enemy is my friend.".

"I don’t have friends. I got family".

"If you die, I die.".

"Thought you could leave without saying goodbye?".

If the dialogue is in the movie to explain the action, that's fine. In this case, though, the writers are trying to make me care about the characters and it falls painfully flat.

To make matters worse, most of the actors in this film can't act. I recall the scene in which Kurt Russell is explaining to Vin Diesel why he needs to take this "one last job". Initially, Diesel's character doesn't want to participate in the caper, but Kurt Russell provides the right motivation to change his mind. However, had the sound been muted, I would never had known. I would have watched Vin Diesel stare angrily, with his most "badass" glare, for 60 seconds. There was no change in expression, no body language, no indication that Vin Diesel had any cognitive activity at all. Just words tumbling out of his mouth as he speaks and agrees to the job as if prompted by someone off screen.

I guess there was some romance, and some drama, too. I couldn't tell. Again, the acting was so poor, and the dialogue was so bland and incongruent, that the director needed to rely on the score to tell the audience how they should feel at that moment. Sad moment = violins. Romantic moment = violins and soaring strings. Even in the middle of one of the many thrilling action sequences, for the 4 seconds when a character glances at his or her true love while their lives hang in the balance, violins and soaring strings. I'm so happy the director gave me those audio cues to let me know that I'm supposed to feel something right then...

Speaking of the action sequences, they were mostly terrific. No longer is F&F about fast cars, it's a full-on action adventure series now. The action was thrilling to say the least. Well shot, well choreographed, and well stunted. Check your sense of disbelief at the door because so many of the stunts and sequences defy all logic and physics. Nonetheless, they were incredible and incredibly fun.

I would like to see more F&F films in the future. My advice, stick with the action and adventure stuff. The "feelings" stuff, it's just not your thing.