Furious 7, Thrilling Adventure, Fitting Tribute

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There's never been a film franchise quite like The Fast & The Furious. What once started out as a bland street racing Point Break rip-off with street racing has grown into the most successful come-back and least-consistently titled movie series ever. The trend of upward quality continues with Furious 7, though by the end you'll probably be fighting back tears while trying to catch your breath.

The story, if you even care about something like that in a Fast & Furious film, picks up directly after Fast & Furious 6, with new villain Deckard Shaw (Jason Statham) seeking revenge on Vin Diesel and friends after they left his brother and F&F 6 villain Owen Shaw paralyzed. This leads Statham's character on a Terminator-style path of rampage, culminating in the death of crew member Han, which occurred in 2006's Tokyo Drift yet happened chronologically between the sixth and seventh films (confused yet?). This trail vengeance also leads to a skull-busting fight between Statham and Dwayne Johnson's CIA agent Hobbs that leaves him out of commission for most of the movie's runtime.

Long story short Diesel and pals have to stop Statham's character before he offs everyone in the crew while also getting caught up in secret agent shenanigans courtesy of the mysterious and aptly-named Mr.Nobody (played by Kurt Russell). Russell, a god of B-movies second only to Bruce Campbell, brings a level of classic action movie prestige to the series that younger newcomers like Statham and The Rock can't. Hopefully he sticks around for another few installments in the series. Everyone else is of the quality expected in a movie like this. If you've seen one Fast movie you've seen them all acting-wise, your not going to find academy quality performances but that's perfectly fine.

Of course, you're not reading this review to find out how great the acting is. Much has been said and reported regarding star Paul Walker's untimely death in late 2013 and how it would affect the production of Furious 7. As we all know now, Walker's unfinished scenes were completed via stand-ins played by his two brothers, archival footage, and digital face mapping from Weta Digital. The result is nearly seamless. While some scenes featuring Walker are curiously reluctant to show him in full lighting or in shot, it's hard to notice unless you are really looking for it.

While the treatment of Walker's final performance is tasteful, it can be difficult at times to divorce yourself from the fiction when so much of the film devotes itself to characters narrowly escaping violent car wrecks. It's a disturbing parallel that is impossible to avoid considering the franchise's core structure and the cause of Walker's death, which can sometimes make the fantastic action happening on-screen a bitter pill to swallow.

Fast&Furious is a series at a crossroads now more than ever. Like the doofy class clown suddenly tossed into the real world, the series has had to juggle real life tragedy in a way that a light popcorn film of it's type should never be asked to do. However what separates these movies from similar mindless blockbusters like Transformers is the true care that is displayed for the characters and their relationships. They aren't just soulless CGI creations being paraded through an endless string of action scenes.

That said, the most dramatic weight Fast&Furious has ever really dealt with before was sub-soap opera level plot lines about amnesia and double-crosses. That's what makes the final five minutes of Furious 7 an even harder gut punch. When the dust settles and there are no more set-pieces to destroy or fists to be thrown Vin Deisel is left alone to eulogize his friend. In these respects, there won't be a movie like Furious 7 for a long time to come. This is the best in the series and the best action movie around until Age of Ultron rolls out,