When I tell you that Furious 7 is one of the most ridiculous movies I’ve ever seen I mean it.  Now that’s not necessarily a bad thing but it is completely absurd.  So let me try to explain why it might be worth your seeing…

First of all, there is a friend of the blog who I had a recent discussion with about Guardians of the Galaxy being a ‘turn off your brain popcorn movie’.  I disagreed with that conclusion; however, my friend Guardians should win a Pulitzer prize compared to this nonsense.  I guarantee you will not like Furious 7. It is not the movie for you.

I kept trying to decide why such insanity is better than the explosions and over the top antics of a Michael Bay movie.  Why are his films so nauseating but something like this still feels fun?  I honestly don’t know if I can explain it.  If any of you have insight I’d love to hear it.  The best I can determine is Michael Bay movies attempt at humor distances the audience from the characters and then he tries too hard to create a reverence around characters instead of just being an over the top action film.

Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles was probably the best he’s done (I know not technically directed by Bay but having his stamp) in a long time.  The problem with turtles is it was edited so poorly I had no idea who they were fighting and where they were so it was just confusing when it should have been fun.  The villain was also muddled and confusing when it should have been awesome Shredder.

Furious 7 has over the top set pieces but I always knew who they were fighting, who the bad guy was and what they were after.  It isn’t as coherent and exciting as 5 and 6 which were basically heist pictures but it ups the anty on the insanity.  Plus, the actors sell the crazy scenes in a way that Bay’s films never do.  It feels like they are having a blast

Anyway, the plot to Furious 7 (not that it matters) is Owen Shaw’s brother played by Jason Statham is out to get revenge for his brother.  He attacks Dwayne Johnson’s Hobbs and they fight (The Rock against Statham not much of a fair fight but it works).  Statham ends up getting information about where the team are and how he can hurt them.

Then Kurt Russel’s Mr Nobody makes a deal with Dom, Brian and the team if they get a macguffin known as the God’s Eye away from terrorists played by Djimon Hounsou he will help them deal with Shaw.  The rest of the movie ends up being a search for the hacker who created God’s Eye and then all over the world to find the actual device.

I wish that the trailer didn’t spoil a couple of the over the top scenes.  It would be more fun for the audience if they didn’t know a car was going to jump from one skyscraper to another but when it is actually happening my theater was laughing and I don’t think that is a bad thing.  It’s so over the top they are asking for that kind of response.  Plus, the actors play it like it is no big deal. There is no Kate Capshaw type character screaming at all the antics . They are all tough guys and girls with tough guy one liners that made me laugh every time.

Maybe it helps I went into this with extremely low expectations, just wanting to be entertained and I was.  As far as flaws it’s a little too long.  By the end I was starting to grow less amused with the antics.  The quick cuts and shaky cam in some of the fight scenes is a little nauseating and got old and some of them go on a little bit too long. They also don’t use The Rock very much.  He’s in the movie for about 15 minutes which seems like a shame with his charisma.  Although when he rips his own cast off and says something like ‘it’s go time…’ I was on the floor laughing.  Still, he could have been used more.   They also love the booty shots of the women which got a little old after a while but at least the women actually did something unlike a Michael Bay movie where they are only gratuitous eye candy.

They did a flawless job dealing with the death of Paul Walker.  Evidently some of him was added in CGI, some was using past movies, film he had shot and his brothers standing in.  I certainly couldn’t tell.  It all looked like him from beginning to end to me.  They also have a lovely tribute to him and a very nice sign off.

With certain movies you have to look at what it is trying to do and then ask ‘did it do it well?’.  With Furious 7 they were trying to make an over the top action film and they do a great job with it.  I’m normally not a big fan of those type of movies but I was entertained by it.  I had a good time.  Take that for what you will.  It’s kind of a hard movie to give a grade too because its so absurd but entertaining.

I will go with…

Overall Grade- B-

Content Grade- C for violence, fighting and gratuitous booty shots.

My youtube review.  If you could watch it and give it a thumbs up that would be amazing.