THE FOLLOWING REVIEW CONTAINS SPOILERS OF THE DISCUSSED FILM. READERS DISCRETION IS ADVISED.
When the prequels of the Fast and Furious franchise connected the dots, it was time for the circle to finally be drawn.
PLOT
Furious 7 follows Deckard Shaw vowing to avenge his brother Owen (Luke Evans), who is severely injured after his encounter with Dominic Toretto and company in Spain. He first targets DSS agent Luke Hobbs while getting information on the team. When fellow agent Elena Neves (Elsa Pataky) gets involved, he throws a grenade to flee. Hobbs saves his partner by grabbing her and taking the fall on top of a car, which injures him. The new antagonist is able to get information on the team before fleeing. He than goes after Han Seoul-Oh (Sung Kang) in Tokyo. As that happens, he plants a bomb at the house of the Torettos. Mia and her son Jack are taken to the Dominican Republic at a house that belongs to Mando (Romeo Santos), an old friend of Dom's. When her brother checks on Hobbs at the hospital, the latter shares that Deckard is a British Special Forces Assassin, more dangerous than his brother. Dom goes to Tokyo to retrieve Han's remains. He meets Sean Boswell (Lucas Black) and picks up such that include his necklace and a picture of Gisele. Deckard retrieved the necklace from Owen's belongings since Letty gave it to him last. At his friend's funeral, he spots his killer and chases him down. They crash into each other and before Deckard could shoot him, he flees when shots are fired by a Covert Ops team, led by a government agent dubbed 'Mr. Nobody'. He makes his allegiance with Dom and requests him to rescue a hacker named Ramsey from terrorist Mose Jakande (Djimon Hounsou). She has made a highly advanced hacking device named "God's Eye". The deal is that if Dom's crew can save her and get the chip, they can use it to find Deckard. At Caucasus Mountains, Dom succeeds in saving Ramsey from Jakande with the aid of Tej Parker, Roman Pearce, Letty Ortiz, still suffering from amnesia, and Brian O'Conner who plans to retire from saving the world after this, as a promise to Mia. Once they're safe and away from their new threat, they go to Abu Dhabi to retrieve God's Eye. Upon arrival, Ramsey is appalled that her friend Safar (Ali Fazal) sold it to a prince when he was supposed to protect it. This leads to the team going into the penthouse to get it back. Rome distracts the guests while Letty sneaks into the prince's room to intercept the network tap controlling the penthouse, before fighting the bodyguard Kara (Ronda Rousey). Tej and Ramsey temporarily take control of the penthouse, while Dom and Brian find the drive to be in an exclusive Lykan HyperSport. When the penthouse gets put on lockdown due to Letty getting caught, Brian and Dom decide to steal the car. While the remaining team flee, the remaining two drive off from building to building to avoid authorities. Brian is able to get the device in time before the car falls to the bottom of the last building. Once the job is done, all meet up with Mr. Nobody and the man keeps his word by allowing Ramsey to use it to find Deckard. He is tracked down to a warehouse, inspiring Dom and Brian to go with Mr. Nobody to stop him. Little did they know of his alliance with Jakande, resulting in a shootout. During this, God's Eye gets stolen from their enemies. Mr. Nobody gets shot in the crossfire, which leads to the protagonists fleeing. Before returning to Los Angeles, their new ally requests to be left left behind on the side of the road so he can picked up by his own personal air ambulance. Upon returning home and now that their enemies have the device, the plan is to have Ramsey hack into her own creation to steal it back. The conflict resumes at night and when that time comes, Jakande tracks Ramsey with Brian. He sends a drone right at them but she swaps car with Tej before Brian gets hit. Brian reaches a cell tower on foot so that their hack can initiate, killing the henchman Kiet along the way. Once the tower is on, God's Eye is back in the right hands. When Hobbs sees the conflict from outside the hospital, he removes his cast and joins the fight. He steals a hospital ambulance to take down a drone, which saves Letty. Dom and Deckard collide once again at a parking garage. After they crash into each other, they fight with debris and metal from their cars. Jakande shoots at the parking garage, hoping to kill Dom. Deckard falls into the rubble but survives. In the second attempt, Hobbs intervenes by shooting at them with a mini gun. Dom drives his dad's car off of the building and places a bag of hand grenades on the helicopter before crashing. When Hobbs notices the bag, he shoots at it with his pistol, which kills Jakande. The team tends to a concussed Dom, worried that he could be dead. Letty talks to him and shares that she's regained all of their memories, including their wedding. This wakes him up and puts him in joy that her memories are back. Sometime later while Deckard is arrested for the crimes, Dom's family celebrates Brian's retirement, excited that he'll have a second child. Dom chooses to leave before saying goodbye to his friend. Brian catches up at a crossroads and both have their goodbye by driving down the road until splitting off into different directions. This makes Dom reminisce everything they've been through up until that point. The film ends with the title card "For Paul", dedicated to the late Paul Walker.
THOUGHTS
I got to see this in the mid summer of 2015 and it goes without saying that this one lives up to the hype. I was caught off guard with the fact that director James Wan would direct this film after spending his entire career at this point involved in the horror genre. He proved me wrong and made this one as fun as the rest, if not brought the most. Every fight/chase sequence is highly stunning. I didn't believe parachuting a car or outrunning a falling bus were legit but when looking up that it is possible to do so, I was able to enjoy that sequences much more. And as always, I remained on board due to the character driven ensemble that truly has such genuine chemistry since first assembling. It's best to discuss the elephant in the room of how heartbreaking it was when Paul Walker died in a car accident with his financial adviser Roger Rodas. After such a loss, the franchise wasn't gonna be the same without him. So I respect how the ending was changed into a tribute for the actor, which helped fans properly grieve. On top of that, the song 'See You Again' by Wiz Khalifa and Charlie Puth has truly grown to be a beautiful of such meaning with its simplicity. We all have lost people we love deeply and every time I hear this song, I am able to accept reality. Returning to the performance, I think the actor was still as good he always was in his final performance. He made us love Brian O'Conner because he was a thrill seeker. In his final appearance, the character has a hard time adjusting to a civilian life as he was so used to danger always coming his way. But when Mia shared to him her second pregnancy, he eliminated the despondence and fully accepted his new life. Seeing him find a way to adapt inspires others like myself and that is a legacy left behind that I will always respect. And seeing the sendoff of the character taught me there is nothing wrong making multiple changes in a single lifetime because it only makes the life more memorable. As I lean into the rest of the cast, Jordana Brewster ain't here much but as Mia, she still remains to be a loving mother by motivating her husband to come back when his last mission ended. Vin Diesel shows Dom who was just settling in but his time of peace gets taken from him when his family is attacked. This puts him back on the road to being vengeful. Despite this, he remains the family man we admire him to be. While his journey wasn't over after this, we know that defeating Deckard put him at peace knowing he got to avenge Han. Michelle Rodriguez brings in another deep level for her performance as Letty. Despite being firm woman outside, her amnesia made her vulnerable within. So when her memories returned, you feel the relief she has when she tells this to Dom. Hobbs may have been sidelined, but Dwayne Johnson still remained a highlight in his given time. While still recognizing him as the formidable badass, seeing his daughter proved how he's as much of a family man as Dom is. He was downright courageous for stepping in the climax when he was still injured. The second he flexed his cast off, you knew he was gonna make an impact once again. And god he looked amazing with the mini gun. Ludacris and Tyrese are still a duo I won't ever get enough in this series in their respected roles. Rome is still hilarious being the egocentric comedic relief and while it comes off cringeworthy, that is the whole point this time and it still makes me laugh. Seeing him freak out as his car is out of the plane is the biggest laugh for me. Tej showing off he can fight aside from hacking again reminds me how there is more than meets the eye. Going into the new cast, Nathalie Emmanuel was interesting as Ramsey because due to her dedication of programming, she is self assured and strong willed. Seeing how quick she cooperated with the others, she really fitted in with the family. I never imagined Kurt Russell would ever be a part of this franchise. Yet he fits right in as well when showing off his charming and easy going personality as Mr. Nobody. The best thing about this character was how he was a man of his word and never had a secret that would affect those he trusts. I knew that when Owen mentioned his brother, he would make a presence but I didn't think Deckard would make it as impactful as this. With the performance of Jason Statham, we see how destructive he can become when his family is in harm's way. Seeing him take out Hobbs and Han overtime proves how determined he was to extract his own justice. I won't deny that I had a blast with this movie, but that doesn't mean there weren't any flaws. First off, Am I the only one disappointed that not seeing Dom's race with Sean? It was clever not showing his race with Brian, but if you're bringing us back to Tokyo, it would've been sweeter to see it play out. It did feel weird how Dom never questioned his necklace being found when he gave it to Letty. If he understood her reasoning beforehand, why don't we see that too? I can't be the only one disappointed how Mr. Nobody's agents missed their shots at Deckard when they get the jump on her. The whole point of getting the jump on someone is to succeed with hitting the target, not aiming badly like most stormtroopers. Also, why didn't Kiet shoot a gun at Brian? I know we want to see Tony Jaa kick some ass but he's just making things harder for himself. Doesn't it sound stupid how Jakande didn't have bulletproof vehicles like Dom? Sure he didn't expect anyone to save Ramsay but he should make his army invincible if he wants to keep what he wants. Because of that, it's ironic how one car got crushed while the others are un-phased. I know Dom is a badass, but it's still weird how he doesn't have some kind of injury until the ending. When he drove off the cliff, he should've got some cuts but no, he's fine. Ramsay gets an excuse because she had a helmet. It is possible for a car to jump building to building, which makes the scene cooler, but the takeaway for me is that I don't think Dom and Brian would've jumped out in time based on how fast it went. I don't these characters to die but I'm just easily annoyed on how bent reality gets within each entry. I do admit that Mr. Nobody is a cool guy but why didn't he have spare night vision sunglasses? I know he uses it temporarily but if he gave one to Dom or Brian, either antagonist between Deckard and Jakande would've been shot. What truly was the dumbest moment for me was how Dom chooses to wait until returning to LA to discuss the plan with the team, rather than doing do during their 16 hour flight from Abu Dhabi. Now that was just plain lazy. If you want to talk about weird, an SUV and a Prius take a red light when Brian does so during the climax. That is a continuity error that'll keep confusing me to this day. Lastly, the suspense rose when Letty gets hit by the drone's missile but it disappears when her car doesn't even flip. You always try to make us worried about Dom but you backfire not letting us worry about the love of his life. However, I do believe you can still enjoy what's presented once you ignore these issues. To sum up, Furious 7 could've been a great finale but remains a fun action film nonetheless. If you have remained a fan from the beginning, see it now.
Comments