There have been a number of flicks that have used hot, custom cars and street racing as their focal point, but The Fast and The Furious
is by far the most visible and by far the best at it. With the next installment, Fast Five, due out later this week, a Deadline interview with producer Adam Fogelson has explained the charted course for the series, which we know will be continuing past this one. We know that because Chris Morgan has already been brought back to pen the script for the sixth film. What Fogelson revealed is that Fast Five is going to be something of a transitional film, which will lead to a departure of the "fast cars" theme they've established and moving into more of a heist flick realm. Here's the key bit...Fogelson: "Can we take it out of being a pure car culture movie and into being a true action franchise in the spirit of those great heist films made 10 or 15 years ago? We’ve heard so many people say, ‘I’ve never seen one, and I’ve never wanted to see one,’ about the Fast franchise. So if these movies were still about street racing, there was probably a ceiling on how many people would buy tickets. We wanted to see if we could raise it out of about racing and make car driving ability just a part of the movie, like those great chases in The French Connection, The Bourne Identity, The Italian Job. Our strategy behind one of the biggest bets we’ve ever made is that the business has gone so far towards CG action every weekend, that we really believe creating a movie with real action and real cars will be amazing stuff to people excited by seeing something real."
The Deadline story reveals some other spoilerish components about Fast Five, but one thing that is clear is that the film isn't as much about cars as the others have been. For Universal, this is an extremely bold move, but not one I necessarily agree with. ALL of the F&F movies have been wildly successful, even the less appreciated ones like Tokyo Drift
. I don't think you screw with what works, you just find new ways to present it. There aren't many vehicular movies left standing, so F&F fills a very lucrative niche. Jumping into the very crowded heist realm could do more harm than good. But it's always possible that fans will keep following because they love Vin Diesel, Paul Walker, Dwayne "The Rock" Johnson(who will definitely be back for more), and the rest of the gang. What do you think? Is this a good move to make? I'll be checking out Fast Five tonight, so I'll have more to report on just what the future of the franchise holds tomorrow morning.
