Highly Overrated But Still Good

Good concept, poorly executed.

Entertaining from beginning to end, it maintains the spirit of the franchise while establishing it's own seal with a fun cast

Great story, amazing characters, superb action, enthralling cinematography. Yes, this is something I am glad I spent money on.

With a few meandering and unproductive features, 'Fast & Furious' takes the series to new grounds. Bringing back familiar faces but finally implementing some much needed emotional depth, the fourth installment was the best of the franchise to that date.Back after a short hiatus are Vin Diesel and Paul Walker playing Dom Toretto and Brian O'Connor respectively. Not that the previous two films were entirely pointless, but Dom and Brian are the heart of the films. Without them, you don't get the same feeling of family and meaningful relationships. 'Fast & Furious' may not feature the high-octane stunts and action that its successors do, but it brought the series back to being about family, and particularly the drama that sometimes goes on between family. O'Connor is miraculously back to being an FBI agent after betraying their trust multiple times in the past, but with this series that type of stuff doesn't matter. Toretto is on the run once again since he went missing following the events of the first film. As ridiculous as it is to see Brian once again after Dom, I feel like it was the one last obstacle these two needed before they gained back each other's trust. Once they do, the film takes off. I love all the tension between Brian, Dom, and Mia, especially knowing where all of them end up. But I also love watching the cast drive insanely fast cars at ridiculous speeds and wreck every bit of them. The fourth film still tries to tell a lame undercover racing/drug/crime story with its villain, but the rest of it is a hell of a ride.The supporting cast includes the likes of Michelle Rodriguez, Gal Gadot, Sung Kang, Jordana Brewster, and John Ortiz. The latter plays the villainous Campos and probably has the most depth and/or personality out of any previous F&F antagonist. Rodriguez is back as Letty, who's death (being a central plot line to the film) is probably the most complicated and convoluted death I've ever seen from any franchise, and I'm still not sure I know exactly what happened.Overall, Fast & Furious progressed the series back to its Toretto vs O'Connor roots, but managed to finally give us the balance of emotion and action that we've wanted. It also happens to be the film that set up what is now more of a heist franchise than it is full of big muscles and muscle cars.+Dom & Brian+Finally balances emotion and action+Supporting cast is written and acted very well-Letty's death & Brian's time with the FBI is still puzzling8.2/10

Vin Diesel and Paul Walker made one "The Fast and the Furious" movie together, a movie that was debatably decent – at best – back in 2001. Eight years (and two other "Fast and Furious" movies) later, Universal Pictures decides a reunion is in order, and whether that decision came out of a genius inkling or total desperation, it worked – to the tune of an April box office record and the restart of a movie franchise that was always meant to be."Fast & Furious" doesn't give this series a facelift (a new paint body/paint job? I'm not good with car metaphors), but time has worked in its favor. Director Justin Lin (spin-off "The Fast and the Furious: Tokyo Drift") definitely has a more modern sense of style that makes this movie feel made in another era compared to the original "Fast and the Furious" and "2 Fast 2 Furious," which definitely show their age. Part of this is thanks to improvements in CGI and green screen technology, but Lin also employs a grittier, hand-held approach. From the first few minutes of the film, which shows Dominic Toretto (Diesel), girlfriend Letty (Michelle Rodriguez) and the rest of their gang trying to hijack a tank truck in the Dominican Republic, it's clear that visually speaking, "Fast & Furious" has greatly improved over its predecessors. In terms of the story – that's another matter.The same situations and plot schematics from previous films unsurprisingly show up in "Fast & Furious." O'Conner is working for the feds again causing his superiors' headaches and he and Toretto are again placed at odds with each other as they're after the same Mexican drug lord, albeit with different tactics in mind. They even must race each other to get in with the bad guy. All this is to be expected, however, given the "reunion" aspect of the story. Plenty of dialogue tilts toward a reminiscing vibe in hopes of conjuring up fond memories for people who loved the original. The film thinks and acts as though it's building on that movie's "legacy," but the reality is that it's trying to erase the previous two films a bit and fix its own trajectory. Fortunately, it does, though not nearly as well as it thinks it has.Writer Chris Morgan – also brought over after his work on "Tokyo Drift" – demonstrates a sound understanding of what made the first movie good, and that's the Dom-Brian relationship. He constructs a new up-and- down journey for the two of them, much of which hinges on past feelings. Morgan devotes the downtime of the script to this relationship. It goes beneath the surface, which the first films (and especially "2 Fast 2 Furious") failed to do. Quick scenes of a brooding Diesel as Dom reflects on the anti-climactic loss of Letty (the news is just dropped in as exposition) don't generate an emotional response, and you can guess exactly what O'Conner will say as he tells Mia (Jordana Brewster) why he let Dom go in the first film, but these moments, cliché as they are, do help endear us to the characters a little more. More important than anything, the superficial MTV Spring Break vibe has dissipated (aside from one party scene early on and a little too much Pitbull music). The film is far more respectful of its female characters, even if there aren't enough of them in important roles. Mia is not an important role – she's the men's emotional sounding board.Of course, the action is still the most important part of these films, and Lin brings the kinetic energy that keeps "Fast & Furious" engaging. He does employ some of the same race and chase sequence techniques (the CGI view inside the engine sadly returns) that previous directors employed in their films (showing the speedometer, gear shifts, feet moving on pedals, etc.) but it's a little smoother and delivers more mouth-agape moments. Unfortunately, the climactic tunnel chase is dark, computer-heavy and a little disappointing on the whole.Putting all details aside, "Fast & Furious" achieves what was undoubtedly the most critical objective for its producers and Universal: get this once-promising franchise back on track. It does all the dirty work necessary to get its main characters back together and on the same page so that future films can take them in potentially exciting new directions.~Steven CThanks for reading! Visit Movie Muse Reviews for more

Fast & Furious 4 teams up everyone from the original film and some new faces like Gal Gadot (Batman V Superman: Dawn Of Justice). Fast & Furious 4 is what you saw from the previous 3 films action, car chases, hot chicks, one liners and so on. The Fast & Furious series is not something that is going to win any Oscars for Best Picture or anything but it's still a very well made franchise that knows it's fans and what they want. Just by the ending of this movie you understand that they were aiming for a fifth movie also and aww boy did they became much much better? Verdict: Fast & Furious 4 will be loved by it's fans and hated by it's haters.

Vin Diesel and Paul Walker are back, and they are having to work together even though they kind of don't really like each other still. The movie basically is all about the bad guys and the good guys being Walker and Diesel where both of them have the old shared enemy thing going on and have to help each other to achieve their goal. The plot kind of plays out like a crime thriller but with lots of cars, in fact I even felt at times like the cars were not as important in this one as before, they don't talk about them as if they are humans like they have before. The reasons I think this movie is poor I will go into but first I must say if you haven't seen the one's before this then go and watch them or this will make no sense.Let's start with the actors and the star attractions to the show, Paul Walker and Vin Diesel return in the style they left us with last. The duo have a strange problem in which I felt was actually the director and writers fault, giving them lines that make them look really dumb and obvious although neither actor does that well in this. The film has a lot of poor acting throughout and though it definitely isn't really dislikeable, still just far from good enough in this already high grossing franchise. The thing is I didn't hate this movie far from it in fact it isn't actually bad, but for me it is too close to being bad for it to even break average, the whole story is pretty basic but the people behind the scenes are the one's who make it a let down.Justin Lin is the man in the directors chair and for me he is again poor, the vision he sets out is just too like I said before, obvious, and he turns some moments which could have been good into over the top action and acting. Chris Morgan writes again and the collaborating between Lin and Morgan just is not going well, the dialogue is messy and like I said the whole plot is set out in such a generic and basic way. This movie will try to draw you in with all its action and big chases and races but all of it is false things to make you excited and I refused to be won over by disappointing work behind the scenes. Now the fourth instalment is probably somewhere so far into the series around third in my rankings, just about better than Tokyo Drift but below the first two. If you're interested in the series and have maybe already really connected with certain characters then maybe you will enjoy this more than I did and although I didn't really not enjoy it, I just felt it too much of a mess to be a film I could look back on with positivity. What Justin Lin tries to create is a movie that is fast but sombre and contains a whole lot of one-liners to try and impress, some come off well but the majority do not and overall I didn't feel pleased enough by the lines.So The Fast and Furious marches on and although this does it fast and furious, they forgot to make it actually good. One weird thing I felt about this was that actors like Walker and Vin Diesel are getting better as their respective characters and for the first time in the series since the first maybe, I could feel a little connection with them if only in select points. Finally I would recommend this to of course fan's of the series but also those who like big stunts and a bit of action + fast cars too, it feels a bit like a movie that someone attached NOS too and then flung into a cinema screen full pelt.