Fast and Furious is the fourth entry in the car racing franchise (although you wouldn’t know that from the title). I guess Fast 4 Furious doesn’t make much sense in the naming game. All you have to know is that, unlike the past 2 entries, both Vin Diesel and Paul Walker are back in L.A. in order to take care of unfinished business which involves, of course, fast cars and racing. Although surprisingly, there is less of car racing in this movie and if you are expecting lots of thrilling car races through the city at night, you will be disappointed.

Instead what you get is a better than the other 2 sequels overall. Storyline is more coherent, characters are developed slightly more and it is fun to see Vin Diesel and Paul Walker back in action together. In Fast and Furious, Brian O’Connor, an undercover FBI agent that no one seems to recognize (I guess they haven’t seen the first movie yet), and Dominic Toretto must infiltrate a drug operation where they drive cars filled with drugs through the US-Mexican border.

The movie is set between the events of the first one and the third one and it tries to tie everything together, which is a noble goal. But you aren’t watching this movie for its storyline or character development. Instead you want car races, car chases and action. There is a lot of girl on girl on girl kissing (maybe filmmaker’s fantasy), but many of the cars get plenty of screen time. If you suspend your sense of belief and just enjoy the ride, you will find a competent action movie that is perfect for the franchise fans. You may need to watch the first movie, confusingly called The Fast and the Furious, to figure out all the relationships but it isn’t a requisite to understand the bare bones story in this one.

Rating: 70%