Review of Furious 7 (2015) by Russell Q — 12 Jan 2016

The strength of the latest Fast & Furious film stems mostly from the drama surrounding Paul Walker's death during the filming. I would say, in general, the film itself is pretty similar to the past two entries - kind of a fresh energy surrounding scaling up the set pieces and introducing a couple new characters into the central group of characters (in this film it's a hacker who's SO SO GOOD).

I would say the only real thing setting it apart in a big way is the huge scale of stunt work, kind of how the newer Mission: Impossible films are really just going bigger and keeping the story pretty constant and taking a back seat. Really giving that action it's time to shine is kind of creating an action Renaissance of the 2010?s. In general, we're still seeing the same kind of over-the-top, cliche lines and a "Go find the thing/person, save them, kill/capture the bad guy." story. BUT WHOA MAN THROW DEM CARS OUT A PLANE TO DO IT. See what I mean?

As I mentioned we also get a surprisingly VERY touching and sad send-off for Paul Walker in the last 5 minutes, featuring throwback footage from earlier films. It's so sad and good! This is one of those films worth seeing in theaters for the scale, absolutely.