THE FAST AND THE FURIOUS: TOKYO DRIFT (2006)

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"You're representing me now. What you think, I'm gonna let you roll in a Hyundai?"

When I'd heard that they had a new "The Fast and the Furious" movie on it's way back in 2006, I was very excited about it. My friends told me that it had commercials playing on TV, and so I tuned in waiting for some so that I could get very much psyched about it, like I knew I would. At this time, you have to realize, I had no access to MovieWeb and it's fine database of info, so my movie information was gained by sloppy Google searches at the library after school every other day. Anyway, one night while I was watching one of the many shows that I watched, I saw the trailer for "The Fast and the Furious: Tokyo Drift....." And immediately lost interest in it. Why? You ask... Answer is simple. Not only could they not get Vin Diesel this time, but they also couldn't get Paul Walker, and so when both characters were found to have disappeared from the series, my interest in the movie just disappeared. Anyway, the next couple years went by, and my friends told me how awesome it was. Anyway, I joined here, and eventually, what do I find? They've released a trailer for "Fast & Furious," set to come out in 2009, and I thought, "Maybe I should watch 'The Fast and the Furious: Tokyo Drift." Well last saturday, I watched "The Fast and the Furious: Tokyo Drift," and I must admit that I was incredibly surprised with it. This still isn't as good as the original "The Fast and the Furious" movie, but I'd say it ties equally with "2Fast 2Furious," which is great scoring in my mind. While you find yourself missing Paul Walker and Vin Diesel, you also enjoy the new characters of the movie, and quickly get over the fact that they're missing. Definitely a surprising film, and I'm kind of mad at myself for going so long without having seen it. Definitely not as bad as I'd thought it would be.

Justin Lin directs this installment in "The Fast and the Furious" series. He hasn't directed a lot of movies, but he did direct the new "Fast & Furious" that just came out a couple of weeks ago. With this movie he does a great job. He creates a lot of interesting and fun angles and filters for the movie, that not only increase the intensity of the car races and chase scenes, but also do an interesting job of portraying the city of Tokyo itself. It's very cool, and Lin makes that work. He also makes it seem like it's right at home with the other "The Fast and the Furious" movies. It doesn't FEEL the same as the other two, anymore, but that's most likely because it's in a newer part of the world, and most of the movie takes place after dark. Lin defintiely does a good job of creating not only a new movie in the series, but also a new feel for the series. The writers of this movie is Chris Morgan.This is something new in the series, too. The last two installments in the series had about three or four writers working on the story. This one only has one guy, Chris Morgan, and this one guy does an excellent job with the story of this one, too. I don't know whether "Drifting" is real or not, but it makes for an excellent, and very original idea for the series, and not only is it excellent and original, it's also fresh. Before it was just little races to one destination, though, admittedly, they weren't exactly "little." Now we've got a whole new style of racing, and it makes for a fun and interesting take in the racing world. Like I said, I don't know if "Drifting" is real or not, but it sure as hell looks cool, and fun, too. The story itself really is fun, and makes it's way, very welcomed, I might add, into "The Fast and the Furious" series very well. Both the Director, AND the writer do a great job at putting together this fresh installment in one of the best racing series that's out there in the movie world.

The visuals in this movie are no different than it's two predecessors. The whole movie is wrought with the presence of fast cars, and not only do these fast cars go... well... FAST... but they also are very sleek, and looks pretty fucking awesome. I think my favorite car in THIS movie, was the black car that D.K. drives at the end of the movie. It crashes, but it's pretty fucking sweet. Not only do these cars look fucking awesome, but in their respective scenes, and car chases. The different angles and filters that the director of this movie chose are utilized very well in the chase scenes, and not only are the cars and characters alive as they all race, but the city of Tokyo itself is also very much alive. It's very cool to see the city throughout the film because it goes to shots of the whole city, and all sorts of different spots in it. I would also like to specifically mention one verry interesting car. This car is green, and it has giant fist-print indents in it all around. On the front of this green, fist-imprinted car is a giant picture of the Hulk's face, and his mouth is wide open in a giant scream. It's one of the weirdest, stupidest, and quite possibly, AWESOMEST, things that I have ever seen. It's really weird, and it's funny to see when it's introduced. Watch the movie to find out what car I'm talking about. It's very interesting. All of these visuals do their job very respectably. This job is making this movie as interesting as it possibly can. When you think of a movie like any of them in "The Fast and the Furious" series, you think about fast cars, yes, but you also think about beautful, sleek, and wickedly intense cars. This movie, like the two before it, delivers just that. This movie has some of the best cars that have been shown in the series, aside from Vin Diesel's muscle car in "The Fast and the Furious." Nothing in this series will ever beat THAT amazing car. Anyway, the visuals in this movie are definitely done very well, and really add to the movie very well.

Storyline is something that, at this point in the series, has continued to surprise the hell out of me. When I first started to watch "The Fast and the Furious," I wanted to know how the hell they could make a movie like this, that's supposed to be serious, about racing, and have a decent plot with good character development in it. It's amazing what they did with that movie alone. Then, my skepticism grew for "2Fast 2Furious," when I found the absence of Vin Diesel's character, Dominic Toretto, I wondered how the hell they'd be able to do a decent sequel for "The Fast and the Furious." Well... After watching "2Fast 2Furious," I found out that such a sequel was not only POSSIBLE, but it was also executed wonderfully. Now we get a second sequel, the third movie in "The Fast and the Furious" series, and not only is Vin Diesel's character, Dominic Toretto, missing, but so is Paul Walker's character, Brian O'Connor. You'll have to forgive me for thinking that such a sequel was blasphemous. Well... Here we are and I am proven wrong. This is a very original concept for the racing genre, even though the story itself, an underdog rising to the ranks of kind (Basically), is not that original, it's nice to see a fresh idea in the area that the movie is most famous for, which is racing, as I said. This one does a great job of developing the characters, I think, though for me, personally, the main character, and his incredibly fake Southern Accent drove me insane, and I couldn't really stand him. You get the feel for most of the characters, as they're all going around, which is a great job in the writing of the storyline, which, like I said, is not that original of a concept. A kid, not accepted by anyone, and not really caring is always causing trouble. When his Mother sends him to live with his Father in Tokyo, the kid learns about a different style of street racing, and is quickly pulled into the heart of the Tokyo underground Racing scene. It's a great story, like I said, though not that original. It does a great job of keeping your attention right from the start, and not letting go of it throughout the whole movie. DEFINITELY a great job on the storyline for this movie.

Sean Boswell (Played by Lucas Black of "Jarhead") is a Southern boy, with the accent and everything, but he is also a HUGE troublemaker, and has been through many different schools because of his deviance, as well as his street-racing tendencies. At the beginning of the movie we find Sean getting into a huge and destructive car race with a football player, Clay (Played by Zachery Ty Bryan of "Home Improvement" in a special cameo appearance) over Clay's girlfriend, and who gets to take her out, after the race, the police have picked the both of them up, and are holding them at the station. Sean's Mom arrives, and, as unfair as it is, Clay and his Girlfriend are going to get off Scott Free because they've got the money to post bail, being in rich families. The mother has had nearly enough of this, and they have a talk with the officer, who tells her that they are aiming to send Sean to jail. His mother begs to not allow this, and reaches a decision. As the leave the room, Sean wonders where they'll be going next, since he's used to moving. His mother informs him that SHE is not going anywhere, but HE will be moving to Tokyo to live with his father, Major Boswell (Played by Brian Goodman of "Blow"). His father immediately lays down the rules when his son arrives. Sean is to return home everyday, STRAIGHT from school, and he is to not go NEAR a car under any circumstances. Major Boswell informs Sean that he will live by the rules, and everyone will be happy about it. Sean finds that fitting in at a school in Tokyo will be much harder than previously imagined. In his first class of the day, he notices the prettiest girl in the class, as is wont to happen in this movies, and she laughs at him as the teacher tries to tell him something, in Japanese, when she wants him to put on the slippers for the classroom. As he is trying to get through the day, he meets a kid named "Twinkie" (Played by Bow Wow of "All About the Benjamins"), who seems to be like him, an outsider of the school. Twinkie tries to sell Sean all of these different things, and it doesn't fly, so immediately Sean asks about what Twinkie drives, and Twinkie takes him to see his car. A strange, green, Incredible Hulk-mobile. Brian asks to drive it, and so they go around to a few places. That's when Twinkie takes Brian to where everyone into street racing hangs out. Brian instantly feels at home again, though it will be short-lived. As he is hanging around and watching everyone, he sees the girl that he had noticed in his first class. He starts to talk to her, and finds out that her name is Neela (Played by Nathalie Kelley in her first acting gig). As he is talking to her, the head hancho of sorts for the racing world notices, and heads over. Neela is HIS girlfriend, and of course, Sean's presence, as is ALSO wont to happen, is threatening to his status. His name is D.K. (Played by Brian Tee of "Fun with Dick and Jane (2005)"), which we later find out stands for "Drift King." He automatically gets in Sean's face about everything. However, Sean being used to such attitude, isn't flustered, and gets back in D.K.'s face, challenging him to a race. D.K. knows that Sean has no car, and tells him not to ask for races, when he's got no way of racing. That's when D.K.'s friend, Han (Played by Sung Kang of "Live Free or Die Hard"), tosses Sean the keys to HIS car. Twinkie, being there, immediately tells both of them, Han and Sean, that they're nuts. Then he tells Sean what D.K. stood for. Sean asks what drifting is, and as he steps out onto the raceway, he sees to cars drift by, and immediately knows that he's gotten himself in over his head. Twinkie, upon request, gives Sean a very fast drifting lesson. As things go about, it is clear that Sean will not be able to do this upon first try, and in the process of losing, he destroys Han's car. Well, the next day, after school, Han tells him to get into another car that he owns. He informs Sean that he will be running things for him and working to pay him back for the car that he destroyed. Han also agrees to teach Sean how to drift, though he doesn't understand the point of racing, when all you're going to win is fame. Han informs Sean that that he only races when it really matters, not just to gain fame. During all of this, Sean is working on wooing Neela, and it is working very well, however D.K., who proves to be a constant pain in Sean's ass, is constantly threatening him. When Sean manages to get Neela to go out on a date with him, D.K. finds out, and beats him up the next day. Neela, tired of D.K.'s bullshit, then breaks up with him, and starts up something far bigger than they could have ever imagined. D.K. is not only accepted by everyone because he is the Drift King. He is also famous because of his Uncle Kamata (Played by Sunny Chib of "Kill Bill: Volume 1"), who is a big Japanese mob boss. When D.K. finds out that Han has betrayed him, an all out war insues, the likes of which is going to be very hard to stop from happening. The actors in this movie all do very well with their parts, except for Lucas Black, who, while his acting is good, his incredibly fake Southern Accent was driving me nuts the entire movie. Other than that quarrel, all of the actors and actress do their parts pretty well, and make great characters, getting down each character's individual traits, emotions, worries, and feelings, and just making each one distinct from the others, which is always a great thing to see in movies. So while I had some issues with one character, the overall cast was pretty good, and all were definitely good casting choices for the movie.

All in all, this movie was not as bad as I had thought it would be when I initially saw the previews for it. It turned out to be a fun movie, and while I missed all of the characters of the first two movies, the characters (With the exception of Lucas Black's character, Sean Boswell) were very easy to geet used to, and were also, for the most part, very likeable. The director of this film really does a great job with it, creating interesting angles and filters to make the racing scenes of the movie very intense, and fun to watch. He also, while taking away the feel of the first two movies, creates a new feel for the movie that slightly mirrors it's predecessors. Definitely a great director. The writer of the movie does a great job with the story, and while, like I've said, I'm not very familiar with "Drifting," as well as not even sure if it is a true form of racing, he creates a fun atmosphere for the film, while switching up the racing styles so that they would not be the same thing from the first two movies, as awesome as they were. Definitely a great job by the writer of this movie. The visuals of this movie, like they were in the movie's predecessors, are extremely fun to watch, and very intense as well. Great looking cars, and an interesting-to-watch new racing style really do well for the film. The visuals were DEFINITELY done excellently for this film. The storyline of this movie is not that original, as I've said, but it brings about a new style of racing, which is fresh and nice for the series. It also does a good job of going on without ANY of the actors from the first two films, which is something that I didn't think was possible. DEFINITELY a great job on the Storyline for this movie. Acting is what rounds everything about this movie together. While none of the actors are AMAZING in the movie, they all do a pretty good job with their characters, save for the INCREDIBLY FAKE Southern Accent from Lucas Black, and they all deliver performances that are VERY Convincing, VERY Believable, and VERY Realistic, as well as the fact that they also deliver performances that you can feel for, and in some cases, EVEN RELATE TO, on variously different levels. Definitely great casting for the acting of this movie. So if you had your doubts about this movie, like I did, set them aside and watch the film. It may not be for everyone, but it's DEFINITELY not total shit, and it's DEFINITELY not something that a fan of "The Fast and the Furious" movies should skip over. So trust me, and set your doubts aside and watch this movie. It deserves a watch by any fan of "The Fast and the Furious" movies, and you will most likely not be disappointed at all. I know I wasn't!!!!!

THIS CONCLUDES PART THREE, "THE FAST AND THE FURIOUS: TOKYO DRIFT," IN MY REVIEW SERIES FOR "THE FAST AND THE FURIOUS" MOVIES. STAY TUNED FOR PART FOUR, "FAST & FURIOUS!!!!!"