Franchise just enough to pull ’em back into theaters?
“F9: The Fast Saga” is just OK. But amid a pandemic recovery, and factoring in the soothing relief provided by a large, loud summer movie, “OK” has officially morphed into a synonym for “good enough.”
This thing has everything. It has rocket cars in space. It has giant magnets pulling trucks through buildings and out the other side. It has a cameo by Cardi B. And it has quiet interlude between franchise anchor Vin Diesel (back as Dominic Toretto) and Michael Rooker (as some guy named Buddy), showcasing two of the growliest actors alive. Maybe Nick Nolte can hop on for “Fast & Furious 10.”
As a bonus, director and co-writer Justin Lin’s outlandish bash includes handy lessons in critical race theory — the other
kind. Early on, Dom and the FF crew are barreling through a Central American valley pockmarked with landmines. The theory: Faster and furiouser wins the race against death, which turns out to be true in practice.
In Edinburgh, another critical race commences, starring John Cena as Jakob, the villain’s henchman
and Dom’s dad-likedyou-better brother. Jakob ziplines across the city after stealing a key part of the Tesseract — sorry, the spherical glowing plot device known as “Project Aries” — while Dom pursues from street level.
So much for Earth. At one point in “F9,” Tej (Chris “Ludacris” Bridges”) and Roman (Tyrese Gibson) find themselves orbiting Earth in a rocket-powered Pontiac. Clock’s ticking, and they have mere moments to destroy a satellite that holds the key to worldwide digital communication destruction favored by Charlize Theron’s Cipher.
“Two dudes from the ghetto … in outer space,” Bridges says. If that laugh line sounds moldy and/or lame, it’s worth remembering that the first “F&F” 20 years ago was, in part, about stealing VCRs. A little bit “Moonraker,” a little bit “Mission: Ridiculous,” the later “F&F”s are essentially mashups of the last 20 movies played in those VCRs.
Co-written by Lin and Daniel Casey, with a firm grasp of how loose this enterprise can get and still get by, “F9” hauls Dom and Letty (Michelle Rodriguez) out of their solemnly perfect off-the-grid existence with son Brian (Isaac Holtane and Immanuel Holtane) to block that apocalypse alongside their comrades. The best of the bunch? From where I sit, it’s Nathalie Emmanuel’s returning computer hacker Ramsey. She lightens the load simply by getting on with it and enjoying herself. Sung Kang’s Han returns as well, even though he died in “Fast & Furious 6.”
It has been true for many years now: The “F&F” franchise is the most democratic, multiethnic franchise in modern movies, and it’s plainly better for it. “F&F” has its roots in a street-racing hit, while its present and future, for better or worse, lies in a world beyond Bond or Ethan Hunt. While I wish the story and the banter had some snap, and while I wish the electromagnet-derived mayhem in “F9” led to a truly magnetic movie, sometimes good enough is enough.
MPAA rating: PG-13 (for sequences of violence and action, and language) Running time: 2:23
How to watch: Opens June 24 in theaters only.