Fast & Furious Presents: Hobbs & Shaw - So much macho fun

I was never much of a fan of the 'Fast and Furious' franchise (apologies!) - somehow they all just merged into one, long overblown car chase.  However, luckily I've always been a fan of both Dwayne 'The Rock' Johnson and Jason Statham, so I was more than happy to give the 'spin-off' film a go.  I heard the film-makers point out that this will have a 'different feel' compared to the usual racing-orientated movies that have gone before and - luckily for me - they were right.

What you have here is an action movie that feels like it would be more at home in the eighties or nineties when action films were completely overblown and deliberately over-the-top.  Post 2000 the genre decided to take a more 'serious' approach and go for 'realism.' That's okay - the last twenty years or so have also produced decent (serious) action flicks, but if - like me - you grew up on muscle men killing hundreds of foot soldiers, armed with only their biceps and a witty quip, then I think you'll like this.

It's silly and it never tries to be anything other than good fun.  The Rock and The Stath have perfect comic timing and the banter between them is a joy to behold.  Idris Elba is given the duties of being the villain and does brilliantly with the - slightly corny - dialogue he's been given and proves he can be up there with the best of the Bond villains from yesteryear.  Plus there are also some very famous faces among the cast list who you might not expect to see pop up here and there - I won't spoil it.

Of course there's plenty of ridiculous stunts and action.  Plus people can take seemingly infinite amounts of punishment and barely get a bruise.  You need to totally suspend your disbelief if you want to enjoy this for everything that it deserves to be.  I had great fun with it, but - in my opinion - the only thing that really stopped it being an absolute classic was its length.  It's well over two hours and at one point about three quarters of the way through the film (when they arrive on Samoa) there is about twenty minutes or so that really seems to drag.  Maybe it's been because what's come before was so fast-paced, but it really could have been left on the cutting room floor.

I'm glad they still make cheesy action movies like this today.  It's part (old) Bond, part Fast and Furious and part Expendables.  All in all, it's just a great film to put your mind of hold and just say, "Yeah, whatever," to with a smile as one person drives a motorcycle up a wall... or something.  Bring on Hobbs and Shaw's next madcap outing.

8/10 The Force is definitely strong with this one