★★★★★★★★★★

Whilst on a dangerous mission in Germany, Dominic Torretto (Vin Diesel) betrays his crew and steals a powerful weapon of mass destruction, which he then hands over to notorious cyber terrorist Cipher (Charlize Theron) who is hell bent of world domination. Its now down to Lettie (Michelle Rodriguez) Tej (Ludachris) Roman (Tyrese Gibson)  Hobbs (Dwayne Johnson) and in a strange twist, Jason Statham’s Deckard Shaw (the baddie from part 7) to bring down Dom and Cipher before World War Three kicks off.

Yes folks you read that right  – we have now gone from a simple tale of illegal street racers who hijack lorries to some how bringing the planet to the brink of of world war three .

So lets get it out of the way shall we? Ok i’ll say it  – the Fast and Furious films are very very very silly – so much so that they make the A Team and The Wacky Races look positively believable by comparison. Since the fifth entry we have been witness to half of Rio being destroyed, Ferrari’s  flying through skyscrapers , freeway set tank chases, helicopter gunships in LA and parachuting sports cars. Indeed so mad are these films that it is my firm belief that they should be stuffed in a glass jar and studied. Nevertheless  – and dear God i cant believe i’m saying it again  -one simply cannot help but bloody love them.

So what of this latest entry in the FF franchise?. Well mercifully once again we have another bonkers action extravaganza, featuring thousands of hacked “zombie” cars that terrorize the streets of NYC and a Siberian set submarine chase sequence that had me grinning from ear to ear. Its also well directed by series new comer F Gary Gray, and has a nice streak of humour throughout, mainly involving Dwayne Johnson’s very butch Agent Hobbs and Jason Statham’s Shaw, that at times made me laugh out loud. No where is this more evident than in a scene where the seemingly superhuman Johnson manages to single handedly fight off a speeding torpedo and then a frankly hilarious sequence involving Statham, a plane load of armed goons, alot of bullets,  and one very cute baby – i’ll say no more but safe to say that this is destined to  go down as one of the funniest and most entertaining bits of comedy/action that you will see for a very long time!

Performance wise it isn’t bad ether  -the aforementioned  Johnson and Statham are too good for words and seem to be having a wail of a time, Kurt Russell returning as Mr Nobody is also great value, finally Charlize Theron as Cipher is evil as all hell and makes for the best baddie in the series so far. Indeed it is most of the supporting actors that come off best and seemingly carry the movie in ways that Vin Diesel as Torretto simply cant achieve. Despite getting top billing, his is the character i cared about the least –  mainly due to the fact that he gets zero one liners, and is played way too seriously by the somewhat overrated Diesel  – perhaps someone should tell big Vin that this aint exactly high drama and nor is it Shakespeare – these films are about fast cars and things that go bang – thats it – maybe in the next couple of entries we will see him lighten up a bit

To be honest there is little else i can say about FF8  – Paul Walker’s presence is missed at times and for me it wasn’t quite as good as part 7 but the film is so mental and such a good laugh to watch that it transcends serious critique, which is great as frankly there should be more films like this – of late we have been missing some proper good old fashioned  Saturday night big screen entertainment and Fast 8 delivers it in spades – Michael Bay take note   – this is how action films should be made  – big,  bold, brash and daft as a brush – great stuff, loved it.

Author: Will Strong aka Grosse Point Geek