Furious 7

Actors: Vin Diesel, Paul Walker, Dwayne Johnson, Michelle Rodriguez, Tyrese Gibson, Chris Bridges, Jordana Brewster, Kurt Russell, Jason Statham

Rating: 9 out of 10, You don’t go into a Fast and Furious movie expecting grand thespian adventures. What you do get is a series of car stunts, beautiful women, totally impossible action sequences, and some real heart. This was strange on a couple levels. First and foremost was knowing Paul Walker died in the middle of filming. Wondering how they would handle it was in the background throughout. I won’t go into detail in case you haven’t seen it but I thought it was perfect. Understanding we’re not talking War and Peace here but it was classy, poignant, and true to the themes of the series. Nuff said. The other strange aspect was seeing my wife’s favorite boy toy, Jason Statham, as the villain. He’s so charismatic that it was tough reimagining him as truly evil, but he gave it a worthy effort. The film itself was a thoroughly enjoyable romp through the misadventures of the Furious gang, elevating their scams to the global terrorism arena. Needless to say there were the usual plot holes you could drive one of their souped up cars through but this is to be expected and almost reveled in. A lot of harmless fun if you go in sans your Oscar ballot and need for reality.
MVP:  Diesel as Toretta, because this will always be Diesel's show