Fast and Furious 7 Review

Fast and Furious 7 is the latest in the ever growing Fast and Furious franchise starring the usual cast of Vin Diesel, Paul Walker, Dwayne Johnston, Michelle Rodriguez along with newcomers Jason Statham and Kurt Russell. To get this out of the way early this film was obviously affected by the tragic death of Paul Walker during filming and it is noticable when Walker is not present or is filmed from an obscure angle.

 Does this effect the film though? Apsolutely not. While Furious 7 is not the best in the franchise it does everything you would expect from a Fast and Furious movie including big over the top action scenes and some phenomenal one liners. Tyrese Gibson is a particular highlight on that last point with his character Roman throwing out more ridiculous one liners than usual. Fast and the Furious wouldn't be the same without some crazy action and that is here in abundance. If you thought Fast 5 & 6 defied physics then Furious 7 will make them look tame. A car jumping through buildings 90 floors up is one of the more believable stunts in the film. Seriously. However you don't go to this film to watch realistic action scenes you go to see the Rock fire a minigun at a helicopter while Vin Diesel says "family" for the hundredth time and if that's what you want then Furious 7 is the film for you.

It is however not a perfect film. I have never really liked Jason Statham as I feel like he always plays the hard man who hardly says a word and he does the same here. Even though it is clear why he hunting the protagonists down it would be better if his character was a bit more fleshed out. Another issue I took with the film is the criminal underuse of Dwayne "the rock" Johnson. He is without question the biggest action star in the world right now but for some reason after an epic fight with Statham he vanishes for near enough the whole film and then returns for a brilliant action scene at the end. When he is in the film he is by far the best thing about it so I cannot understand why he was so underused.

I could not conclude this review without mentioning how brilliantly the filmmakers and the studio handled the death of Paul Walker. They never tried to capitolise on his death in the marketing of the film and don't make any obvious references throughout the film to his death until the last 5 minutes when they pay a beautiful tribute to him and the character he will be remembered for. The plot is ultimately unimportant when the full package is this good.

8/10