Movie Review – Fast & Furious 6 (2013)

Pop quiz!

What comes after Fast Five?

If you guessed Fast & Furious 6, then you’re correct!  Congratulations!

Fast Five ended with the gang successfully stealing the $100 million in cash from Hernan Reyes, and the gang going off in their own directions.  It was a happy ending that could have ended the franchise right there.  However, a short clip during the credits showed that Letty Ortiz is actually alive, and that she is part of a gang of street raiders in Europe.

You know what that means.

Onward to Fast & Furious 6.

The sixth film in The Fast and the Furious franchise revolves around the gang seeking Letty Ortiz, and them going up against one of their most dangerous opponents yet.  All of your favorite characters are back again for another thrilling ride full of fast cars, plenty of gunfire, and some pretty ridiculous action scenes.

Directed by Justin Lin, Fast & Furious 6 stars Vin Diesel and Paul Walker in their respective roles of Dominic Toretto and Brian O’Conner.  Co-starring in the film are a cast of actors including Dwayne Johnson as Luke Hobbs, Michelle Rodriguez as Letty Ortiz, Jordana Brewster as Mia Toretto, Tyrese Gibson as Roman Pearce, Ludacris as Tej Parker, Sung Kang as Han Seoul-Oh, and Luke Evans as the villain Owen Shaw.

Fast & Furious 6 begins with Dominic Toretto (Vin Diesel) and Brian O’Conner (Paul Walker) racing each other on a tropical island.  It turns out that they’re in Spain’s Canary Islands, and they were actually racing to a local hospital.  Mia Toretto (Jordana Brewster) is about to give birth to her and Brian’s child.  Before Brian goes inside to be with Mia, Dominic warns him that once he steps inside, then his past life no longer exists.  It’s time to focus on the future and of being a responsible father.

Meanwhile, Diplomatic Security Service agent Luke Hobbs (Dwayne Johnson) is working with Interpol agent Riley Hicks (Gina Carano) and investigating a recent attack in Moscow against a Russian military convoy.  He interrogates one of the suspected members of the hit team and learns that the leader of the raiders is Owen Shaw (Luke Evans), a former British special forces soldier.

Catching Owen Shaw is where it gets tricky.  In order to capture somebody like him, it’s going to take somebody with specialized skills.  Luke Hobbs knows just where to go.

Luke arrives in the Canary Islands and meets with Dominic Toretto.   He recruits Dominic into the mission of capturing Owen Shaw by showing him a recent photograph of one of Owen’s gang members — Letty Ortiz (Michelle Rodriguez), Dominic’s former girlfriend.  But she’s supposed to be dead.  There was a funeral for her back in Los Angeles.  Apparently she’s alive after all.

The gang members are assembled.  When Dominic tells Brian about the mission, he insists on helping him rescue Letty and capture Shaw, even though Brian previously stated that he was going to leave his old lifestyle behind him.  This is different.  This time it’s about Letty, and she’s part of their family.

The location changes to London, England, and Luke Hobbs briefs the team on their mission to capture Owen Shaw.  Dominic’s assembled gang members include Brian O’Conner, Roman Pearce (Tyrese Gibson), Han Seoul-Oh (Sung Kang), Tej Parker (Ludacris), and Gisele Yashar (Gal Gadot).  What makes Owen Shaw special compared to the other criminals is that it’s believed that he’s targeting sophisticated military gear in order to construct a super weapon, an electronic bomb that can disable a country’s communication systems.  If you can stop an enemy from communicating and organizing itself, then you’ll have a much greater chance at destroying them in combat.  Such a weapon can be worth billions of dollars to the right buyer.

When Luke shows the gang the photograph of Letty, Brian tells Luke that once they rescue Letty, then they’ll be able to capture Shaw.  Brian strikes a deal with Luke by agreeing to capture Shaw in exchange for full pardons for all of the gang members, allowing them to live again in Los Angeles.

The plan is to have Owen Shaw’s captured henchman wear a wire and to secretly lead the police to Owen Shaw.  The plan works, but just as the police are about to move in and capture Shaw, Tej learns of alarms sounding back at Interpol’s headquarters.  Brian realizes that this whole police operation was a set-up by Shaw himself.

Shaw detonates a series of explosives that disable most of the police officers.  He then escapes in his own little supercar (a modified F-1 racecar complete with armor plating and an angled nose designed to flip other cars).  It’s a dramatic car chase through the streets of London as Dominic’s gang tries to stop Shaw’s gang.

At one point Dominic spots and gives chase to Letty.  He ultimately stops her car, but when he gets out to confront her, she doesn’t hesitate to shoot Dominic in the shoulder.  Letty then drives away and easily escapes.

After the chase sequence, Letty returns to Shaw’s secret hideout.  It turns out that Shaw had recently been investigating Dominic and his crew, and he shows Letty a photograph of her and Dominic.  Letty admits that she shot the guy in the photograph, but other than that she doesn’t remember him.  Now it’s clear that Letty is suffering from amnesia, and she doesn’t remember her past.

Meanwhile, Dominic’s gang is also analyzing their opponents.  They know that Shaw’s gang has a small window of opportunity before they’ll strike again.  They decide to focus on finding the person who built Shaw’s custom cars, and then they’ll be able to find Shaw.  Tej is tasked with finding cars that are not only fast, but they don’t have computer chips that can be overridden by outside sources (one of the techniques used by Shaw’s gang).

Instead of racing for the cars, or just stealing them, Tej uses his wealth to purchase the new cars at an auction.

While that’s taking place, Gisele and Riley “talk” to the mechanic who built Shaw’s cars.  Just as he’s giving them information, some of Shaw’s gang members arrive at the secret garage.  There’s a gun battle and a foot chase as the two gangs fight each other.  The action moves to the London Underground where Riley fights Letty, and Han and Roman fight a different gang member.  Shaw’s team wins and the gang members all escape.

Soon it’s discovered that Owen Shaw has connections to Arturo Braga’s cartel.  It’s the same Arturo Braga (John Ortiz) that Dominic and Brian stopped at the end of Fast & Furious.  Right now he’s a prisoner inside of a U.S. federal prison.  In order to speak to Braga in person, Brian hatches a crazy plan.

Using the help of a former colleague in the F.B.I., Brian is arrested in London and flown back to the U.S.  He’s then admitted into the same prison where Braga is being held.  To make things more convincing, Brian fights his friends and some of the police officers, and he’s then placed in solitary confinement.  Braga recognizes Brian, and he tells him about his connection with Owen Shaw.  Braga also tells Brian how Shaw was going to finish off Letty after her car accident, but he changed his mind and took her in when he noticed that she had amnesia.

Braga and his prison henchmen then fight Brian, but Brian is able to beat all of them.  He’s then pulled out of prison and allowed to leave the country to re-join Dominic and his friends.

Meanwhile, in London, Dominic finds Letty again and challenges her to a street race.  The race begins and the two drivers drive like maniacs on the streets of London.  Dominic wins the race, and afterwards he has a chance to talk to Letty.  Dominic notices that Letty still has some of her same behavior patterns as when the two of them were together.  He shares some stories behind a few of the scars on her body, and then he gives her a silver cross that he had been wearing around his neck.

After Letty leaves, Owen Shaw drives up and meets with Dominic Toretto.  Shaw doesn’t understand why Dominic is out there risking his neck and helping somebody like Luke Hobbs, and he gives him a chance to simply walk away from there.  Dominic makes Shaw a counter-offer telling him that he’ll walk away when Letty is allowed to leave.  Shaw refuses, and then he drives away in his car.

The following day, Luke Hobbs launches a raid on Shaw’s suspected hideout, but Shaw and his gang members are missing.  They had already fled.  When Tej crunches the information in his computer, he discovers that Shaw is going to attack a NATO base in Spain.

Brian returns to the gang and he tries to tell Dominic about the truth of Letty’s situation, but Dominic doesn’t want to listen.  He tells Brian that whatever he learned was for him to hear only.  All of that is in the past.  The gang still has a chance at rescuing Letty if they work together.

When Luke Hobbs arrives at the NATO base in Spain, it’s discovered that one of the soldiers there was caught trying to disable the base’s security system.  In order to keep the computer chip (the last piece of equipment needed by Shaw to construct his super-weapon), Luke insists on moving the computer chip out of the base and in an armed convoy.  With the chip safely outside of the base, they can then ambush Shaw when he later attacks the military base.

On their flight to Spain, Tej informs the group of Shaw’s spy that was captured at the military base.  Brian instantly realizes that the spy is a diversion.  He and Dominic come to the conclusion that Shaw’s intentions are to attack the convoy, and NOT the military base.

Sure enough, Owen Shaw and his gang attack the military convoy in an attempt to steal the computer chip.  Dominic’s gang is ready, and they race down the road and try to stop Shaw and rescue Letty.  What follows is a spectacular driving and fight sequence between the two gangs.  At one point Letty helps Shaw commandeer a tank.  The tank causes tremendous damage and is nearly unstoppable until Brian and Roman manage to flip it.  Dominic rescues Letty and saves her life.  Owen Shaw is taken into custody.

However, Owen Shaw is still in control of his situation.

When Brian left to help Dominic, Mia went to a safe house in the Dominican Republic with their infant son, Jack.  When Shaw was finally captured, some of his gang members attacked the house and kidnapped Mia.  When Brian tries to call Mia, Shaw’s story is confirmed.  Using that as leverage, Luke Hobbs is forced to allow Owen Shaw and his captured gang members to be released from their custody.  Riley leaves with Shaw and we see that she’s been a traitor the entire time.  Letty chooses to stay with Dominic.

Just as Shaw leaves, Tej jams all cellular phone frequencies so that Shaw cannot communicate with anybody else.  This gives Dominic’s gang a chance of catching Shaw again and stopping him for good.  Letty wants to help them capture her former gang leader.

Dominic’s gang jumps into their cars and they chase Owen Shaw and his gang down a runway at the military base.  Just as they’re wondering how Shaw is planning on escaping, an An-124 Ruslan (a gigantic military cargo airplane) lands right in front of them.  Shaw’s plan is to simply drive their cars up the cargo plane’s rear hatch, and then for them to fly to their next destination.

Dominic’s crew tries to prevent them from doing so.  What follows is another spectacular action sequence involving fast cars, gunfire, hand-to-hand fighting, all around and on board one of the largest airplanes ever built.  In the end, Mia is rescued, Letty kills Riley, Gisele is killed while trying to save Han, and Dominic survives when the An-124 crashes to the ground.  Owen Shaw also survives the crash, but he’s badly injured and taken to a hospital.

After finishing their mission in London, the gang returns to Dominic’s home in Los Angeles, California.  Hobbs and Elena arrive, informing the gang that their pardons are official.  None of them are wanted by law enforcement.  Elena also accepts that Dominic is back with Letty, and she decides to join Hobbs and be his new partner.  When the family gathers for a meal, Letty tells Dominic that the place doesn’t look familiar, but it does feel like home.

Fast & Furious 6 ends with a short clip in Tokyo, Japan.  We see that a car intentionally struck Han, and it caused a fatal car accident that killed Han.  The driver of the other car, Deckard Shaw (Jason Statham), calls Dominic and tells him, “Dominic Toretto, you don’t know me.  You’re about to.”

FINAL THOUGHTS

So is Fast & Furious 6 a good movie?

That’s going to depend on what you look for in a movie.

There’s no question that Fast & Furious 6 is a good action movie.  This movie in the franchise has plenty of fast cars, gun battles, fights, and other crazy moments caught on camera.  Yes, there are even sequences with a tank and a massive cargo airplane.

That’s also where the film goes astray and transitions from a good movie into a corny one.  Was it really necesary to push the film over-the-top and have not only a sequence featuring a tank (complete with ammunition) on a freeway, and an An-124 on what is without a doubt the longest runway in the world?  I mean, we see the aircraft land (the engines’ combined exhaust would have easily blown all of those vehicles off the runway, by the way), it continues rolling at a good speed for many minutes, it later takes off into the air and flies for several more minutes, and then it finally crashes, all before reaching the end of the runway.

That’s pure fantasy right there, and it shows.

When you remove the action scenes, you have two main stories driving this film:  the quest for Letty, and the evil intentions of Owen Shaw.

The Quest for Letty

Dominic Toretto’s obsession for rescuing Letty is the main story in Fast & Furious 6.  Last we knew, Letty died two movies ago in Fast & Furious.  There was a funeral for her and everything.  But according to the story in this film, that funeral was fake, Letty had amnesia, and she had been working with Owen Shaw since her “death.”

Even though Letty did not remember her past, she apparently still knew all of her driving and fighting skills from earlier in life, just like Jason Bourne in The Bourne Identity. There’s no reason for it, it just happens.

Anyway, this story is the main focus for Fast & Furious 6, and for the most part it works.  It’s easy to relate to Dominic’s actions as he tries to rescue his former girlfriend and to help her regain her memory of their shared past.

The Evil Intentions of Owen Shaw

Owen Shaw is the villain this time around.

While Owen seems like a pretty evil character, he appears to be too good of a villain for this movie.  The guy is former British SAS.  His team may not drive as well as Dominic’s crew, but they should have easily defeated them from every other angle.  Owen’s crew should have had the firepower and combat techniques to easily defeat Dominic’s team.

But they don’t and Dominic’s crew wins in the end.

If somebody like Owen Shaw could arrange to have an An-124 of all airplanes on hand, then he would have also had a smaller aircraft for close-air-support.  He could have had a simple helicopter armed to the teeth, and used that to defeat Dominic’s team at the end.

At the very least, Owen could have had a couple of machine guns mounted at the rear of the cargo plane.  His team could have used the guns to easily shoot Dominic’s cars.

But none of that happened.

For somebody with superior combat training, and a vast number of resources at hand, Owen Shaw really sucks at defeating basically a group of mechanics who know how to drive cars and kick some ass.

Fast & Furious 6 (2013) – movie trailer

In the end, Fast & Furious 6 is a movie that’s best enjoyed if you turn off your brain.  While the movie itself is pretty good and the story is decent, there are enough cringe-worthy and corny scenes to degrade this film.

Brian O’Conner – “Maybe the Letty we once knew is gone.”
Dominic Toretto – “You don’t turn your back on family, even when they do.”

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Tej Parker – “Uh, guys, they got a tank!”

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Roman: “Father, thank you for the gathering of friends.  Father, we give thanks for all the choices we’ve made because that’s what makes us who we are.  Let us forever cherish the loved ones we’ve lost along the way.  Thank you for the little angel, the newest addition to our family, thank you for bringing Letty home, and most of all, thank you for fast cars.”