Throwback Thursday Review: 'The Fast and the Furious: Tokyo Drift'

Sorry for the delayed review but I decided to instead just knock two birds out with one stone and continue my series of Fast & Furious reviews by releasing my thoughts on The Fast and the Furious: Tokyo Drift and Fast & Furious. Films I hope to see and review in 2017 that I didn't get around to in 2016 include Collateral Beauty and Passengers. 

'The Fast and the Furious: Tokyo Drift' Review

The Fast and the Furious: Tokyo Drift is the third chapter in the Fast & Furious blockbuster franchise that follows teenage troublemaker and street racer Sean Boswell who has to go live with his father and adjust to life in Tokyo after a mishap that leaves him facing a life in Tokyo or American jail sentence. I believe Tokyo Drift was an effort to spin-off the franchise following a new set of characters with hopes of bringing everything together in future installments but in reality I think we've only seen one or two characters reappear throughout the series.

Justin Lin steps in as a fresh face to the franchise and tries to shake things up again by changing the setting, characters, and scenarios. The opening minutes however are cringeworthy as a cheesy high school setting, teen angst, and awful pop music are all brought together for a sloppy setup and the Tokyo environment just feels like a cheap attempt to earn more foreign box office the way it's incorporated. I couldn't help but not care about anything happening as I watched the movie. The characters had arcs but they're generic, the characters are ill defined as one-dimensional space, and the script written by Chris Morgan is pathetic.

The one somewhat redeeming aspect is the races interspersed over the course of the movie but they're only amusing because they're nice cars doing crazy things. The acting is probably the worst in the entire Fast & Furious franchise, thankfully it goes uphill from here, as everyone is a cardboard cutout of previous Fast & Furious character personas. Lucas Black is the young up-coming protagonist, Nathalie Kelley is the sex appeal, Shad Moss is the cheesy comic relief, Brian Tee is a vaguely-motivated antagonist, and Sung Kung is the cool supporting character.

Aptly, my mind couldn't help but drift while I was watching Tokyo Drift. The Fast and the Furious: Tokyo Drift is exactly what viewers expect from a Fast & Furious flick; sleek cars in ridiculous races, flat characters played by awful actors, and little else.

Film Assessment: F