“Greetings from deep in the heart of Texas. Actually we’re a bit further down south than the heart. Im not gonna actually say what that’s likely to make us. Let’s just go with appendix, shall we?
Aaaand I got distracted (as always). This time by my favorite Gleek.
Right so Im stranded down here in Texas, and I actually had most of the day to myself since my mom had to take care of some stuff with her brother. Since I get wicked cabin fever, I opted to spend the evening at the movies instead of marathoning 30 Rock as I’ve been spending most of the rest of my time. The options were pretty \m/ slim. When you omit everything I’d already seen, I was pretty much left with 3 options: Faster, Burlesque (which would make me sad cause Im waiting to see it with my BFF), or Skyline (which would be even sadder, for other reasons all to do with the movie itself). So Faster it was.
I feel I made a good choice. Nothing ‘specially stellar about it, but good mindless action movie, capable of providing enough adrenaline to satisfy this action junkie. However, for a movie called “”Faster”” it started off a lil slow going. Yes I know, Im complaining about pacing yet again, sort of. It was fine, just didnt fit the title. Unless it was meant to mean that you wanted it to go faster? But I kinda doubt that.
What I found to be ambitious was that there were three interwoven lines to the story, with decent character development (slightly moreso than your typical shoot ’em up action flick). You had Driver (Dwayne Johnson), our antihero kickin’ ass and takin’ names and serving revenge cold. Then there was Cop (Billy Bob Thorton) who was tracking him down while battling his own demons. And Killer (Oliver Jackson-Cohen) the hitman after Driver torn between the two loves of his life: his work and his girl. I felt that the movie did to a pretty good job of balancing those three, without half-assing the story, yet not sacrificing action for character development.
Also, Im very happy to see The Rock back in this type of flick after his whole family film fare (cue yet another distraction as I frantically check thesaurus.com for a synonym for digression that starts with f) fork. While I appreciate when an actor takes a break from their usual work to do a movie for their kids, Johnson detoured for how many?! But all is now well with the world. Billy Bob Thorton was a bit typecast as the down on his luck messed up type, but he does it so well. The typecast statement was not a complaint, just a statement of fact.
Nothing too innovative on the action front. One really cool chase scene. And I absolutely loved the first face to face between Johnson and Thorton. I wont spoil, but the visual was gorgeous. The rest was mostly your typical shoot out stuff. Entertaining of course, but not particularly special.
Overall, I enjoyed it. Def feel like I made the right choice for the evening. But its not worth rushing out to the theater for, unless you find yourself in a similar entertainment predicament like I did earlier this evening.
Faster -\m/ \m/ \m/