Directed By Louis Leterrier

Starring – Vin Diesel, Michelle Rodriguez, Jason Momoa

The Plot – Over many missions and against impossible odds, Dom Toretto (Diesel) and his family have outsmarted, out-nerved and outdriven every foe in their path. Now, they confront the most lethal opponent they’ve ever faced: A terrifying threat emerging from the shadows of the past who’s fueled by blood revenge, and who is determined to shatter this family and destroy everything-and everyone-that Dom loves, forever.

Rated PG-13 for intense sequences of violence and action, adult language and some suggestive material

FAST X | Official Trailer 2 – YouTube

POSITIVES

By the tenth film in this trivialized franchise (Eleventh if you count “Hobbs and Shaw”), its cast and crew have wholeheartedly embraced jumping the shark by manufacturing its most self-aware installment to date, full of gravity-defining twists and supernatural storytelling turns that at the very least keeps “Fast X” from ever being boring. In fact, I found myself all the more glued to the screen to see what these characters would attempt next, and quite often my jaw hit the floor for just how far screenwriters Dan Mazeau, Justin Lin and Gary Scott Thompson were willing to push matters, obliterating any semblance of real world consequences in life-threatening stunts that would kill lesser people, but here cement why this family might just be the greatest group of superheroes ever surmized on-screen. Beyond the entertainment value, the film definitely feels like the biggest installment of the Fast franchise, both in the expansive elements of its globe-trotting mission, but also in the elevation of newly materialized dangerous adversary, played maniacally by Momoa with Joker-esque emphasis in demeanor and delivery. On the former, cinematographer Stephen F. Windon, who has commanded the shot selections in a majority of franchise installments, absorbs as much of the beauty and cultural impulses of the geographic scenery, often before Dom and his crew crumble them to ruins, and the latter fully enveloping itself in the superhero dynamic that has since become this franchise, with Jason chewing as much scenery with humorously nagging inserts that he devilishly delights in, making this feel unlike anything that he has attempted on screen, previously. Beyond this, despite many tonal inconsistencies that persist within the film’s disjointed narrative, Leterrier’s direction imbeds the film and these characters with the kind of love and sentimentality that have magnetized each of them as a family before our very eyes, not only enriching the chemistry between them that permeates effortlessly in the confines of so many varying dynamics, but also in adding to the risk factor of their various missions, which often remind us of the monumental stakes in aligning with and expanding on so many characters to its impossible missions.

NEGATIVES

The antagonistic side to embracing self-awareness in a franchise overflowing with logic-leveling moments comes with a stiff price-tag to this heavily flawed installment, especially when a majority of “Fast X” feels like three different films converged forcefully by three different screenwriters. It starts off well enough, with a first act that capably sets the stakes and conflict in the right direction, but by the second act feels like an entirely different film all together, with a sharp tonal evolution and clumsily constructed exposition that leads to the funeral of urgency and vulnerability at a time when each are valued to the interpretation of the audience. For my money, most of the second act should’ve been cut here, especially since they halt the progress of the narrative to summon what are basically just comic skits from each of the various subplots scattered chaotically throughout the globe, and in turn causing Momoa’s effective antagonist to wait on hold while each of the ensemble works their routines. Speaking of the ensemble, “Fast X” really is the realization that not enough stakes have been realized throughout the entirety of this franchise, with now as many as fourteen characters now fighting for time, and a majority of which often left underwhelmed by how little this film capably imbeds for each of them. It’s so bad that it feels like each actor or actress filmed four or five scenes for this film individually, and then the production molded it all together to make a movie, and one that never garners much momentum for the duration of its mangled 135 minute run time. I could also waste time critiquing the abundance of death-defying instances that these characters constantly evade without a single scratch to their unbreakable bodies, but I would much rather spend time applauding how each of these characters are able to prepare for the most unpredictable circumstances ahead of time, allowing them an escape route for devastation that quite literally materializes on the fly. Scratch that, let’s spend time discussing the on-the-nose dialogue and meandering musical score, which obliterates subtleties often in ways an audience can coherently interpret what will take shape in a scene or sequence, long before it actually happens. Any of these warrant an entire review to themselves, but the biggest offenders for my money most certainly stem from the action set pieces and editing schemes for the film, which jarringly make it difficult to even remain focused during key moments of conflict pay-off for the integrity of the film. The action sequences are fun and engaging enough, with bold sound designs and devastation to the highest degree, but they’re elicited with the cheapest looking kind of green-screen that desecrates believability or integral investment, and when combined with shaking camera consistencies of the most stomach-turning variety, often obscure and underwhelm sequences that should be spectacles, but instead come across as obtusely transluscent. The editing consistency throughout is even worse, feeling anxiously overzealous in ways that maximize the jolt spanning of music video familiarity, which is fine during establishing shots, but awful for intimate moments of interaction between characters, with cuts that often feel like they fast-forward ten seconds in a scene, with continuity problems that rear their ugly head by the double. Finally, while I pretty much knew that “Fast X” wasn’t going to be the last film in this franchise, based entirely on the fact that I am never that lucky, the abrupt needle drop of an anticlimactic ending that resolves nothing was the biggest slap of the face to an audience seeking any kind of closure to wrap this installment up, even temporarily. This certainly isn’t anything new for two-part arcs in franchises, but when you consider “Avengers: Infinity War” garnered the biggest gut punch in its final scenes, “Fast X” simply just feels like a film that ran out of time, which isn’t a shocking theory in hindsight when you consider it included comic routines to its final product that should’ve been left as deleted scenes on the Blu Ray extras. To be fair, there is a mid-credits sequence, but it’s essentially just build for a future film, instead of resolution for the one put in front of us, with a last second cameo that all but screams “Who gives a shit?”.

OVERALL
“Fast X” feels like the shark-stomping climax of 22 years’ worth of cinema, with eleven films to A franchise that has done its part to make “Idiocracy” a true story. With supernatural characters, a disorganized narrative, and tonal whiplash by the dozen that feels like the only casualty in the movie, Leterrier loses his grip on the high-octane rush that has dumbly remained charming to this point, but now finds itself grindingly halted by a vehicle that is running on empty, with four flat tires asked to sludge through the inevitability of another installment.

My Grade: 4/10 or D-