A father fights fiercely against ruthless kidnappers to save his abducted daughter.
Chuck says:
I doubt fans of martial arts movies will raise many objections to the many flaws in Kenji Tanigaki’s “The Furious.” Those who flock to films of this sort don’t get hung up on hackneyed dialogue, cliched characters, improbably plot twists or an inordinately long running time. Nope, they lay down their hard-earned cash and buy the largest popcorn-soda combo so they can to settle in to see bone-crunching action and acrobatic derring-do, no more, no less.
To be sure, “Furious” will leave even the most hard-to-please genre fans sated as Tanigaki and his action choreographers pull out all the stops in delivering an imaginative, yet brutal ballet of violence. Much like the “John Wick” films and Jackie Chan’s best movies, this is an exercise in precision and movement, a meticulously rendered revenge tale that despite its blood-drenched aesthetic, impresses with its nimbly executed fight scenes that ultimately border on the comical.
Somewhere in Southeast Asia, or so a title card tells us, is the location of the action. A child trafficking network is the focus, a system that’s allowed to flourish due to public indifference, corrupt officials paid to look the other way and the vast nature of the operation. However, it comes under increased and direct scrutiny from two disparate individuals. Navin (Joe Talsim) is a reporter seeking his partner who’s gone missing while investigating the organization behind this criminal enterprise. Meanwhile, Wang Wei (Miao Xie) is a father desperate to find his daughter Matia (JeeJa Yanin) who’s been kidnapped and is on the verge of being lost among the hundreds of other young victims.
Plots don’t get much simpler than that and why there are three writers given credit on the screenplay is beyond me. No matter; the real workhorses here are the members of the stunt crew and choreographers who obviously put in hundreds of manhours in executing the elaborate fight sequences. There are far too many highlights to mention though a foot chase that finds Wang Wei pursuing a truck containing his unconscious daughter comes to mind. In, on and around the truck as it careens through the streets, Miao Xie is an athletic marvel, seemingly defying gravity at times with his fluid, flexible movements.
He, Talsim and the other performers don’t just jump, kick and chop in trying to break each other’s bones. They twist and turn in mid-air, crawl, scuttle, skip, shuffle and slide in, around and under each other with a precision you can’t help but wonder at. If my mouth wasn’t agape, I was chuckling at the sheer audacity of what was on display. A sequence in which a ladder becomes an instrument of death is particularly impressive, it being one of many unconventional objects used as weapons or shields. (Personally, once they started fighting with bicycles, I think they went a bit too far.)
Thankfully, a dose of meta-humor is employed throughout, Tanigaki not averse to poking fun at the ludicrous nature of all that’s occurring. An extended fight scene involving our two heroes and a rather pudgy, seemingly unstoppable hammer-wielding adversary becomes a comical slapstick affair, as does a later sequence involving a runway motorcycle in a rundown tenement. However, the funniest moment is a parody of the elaborate outfitting action film scenes in which we see the steroid-laden hero strap on numerous ammo belts, knives and guns to save the day. Here, all we see Wang Wei do is put on a knit cap, lace up his steel-toed boots, grab a hammer and head out.
That Tanigaki blows past an obvious ending point and delivers another half hour of exhausting action is overkill in more ways than one. Though I had had my fill of bone-breaking, eye-gouging and limb-rending sights, I’m sure fans will likely have no objection to the film’s length. In the end, despite its many flaws, credit must be given where it’s due regarding the physical skill and filmmaking chops on display in “The Furious.”
3 Stars
