Big Picture Big Sound

A Car is (Air)Borne

Every once in a while a movie comes along that's just too big for one critic to handle. Here at BPBS our hard-working team of reviewers is always ready to step up to a challenge, and this time we needed two of our crew to cover all the action in the super-kinetic, gleefully excessive new buddy flick "Fast & Furious Presents: Hobbs & Shaw." This first spinoff from the startlingly long-lived franchise showcases the outsize duo of Dwayne "The Rock" Johnson ("Skyscraper," "Baywatch") and Jason Statham ("Wild Card," "The Expendables," and lots of movies with punchy one-word titles) as a couple of sparring action heroes who trade punches and punchlines on their quest to save the day. BPBS reviewers Lora Grady and Stuart Shave won't ever be mistaken for action heroes (though we've sent Stuart to more than his fair share of superhero movies: "Venom," "Avengers: Endgame") but they both know their way around a punchline ("The Snowman" wasn't meant as a comedy, but Lora likes to think she found the funny), and when the press screening invite came along, they were ready for the mission: check out "Hobbs & Shaw."

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Gritty upstart actioner "The Fast and the Furious" debuted in 2001 as a something of a sleeper, but its mix of slick street-racing action and heartfelt family ties, plus the charismatic combo of lead actors Vin Diesel and Paul Walker, connected strongly with audiences. $140 million at the box office later, a franchise was born. Over the course of the seven films that followed a number of actors have dropped in on the proceedings, until the roster eventually included Dwayne Johnson as government security agent Luke Hobbs, and Jason Statham as British Special Forces assassin Deckard Shaw. Producers saw potential in their pairing, and lo and behold, squabbling comic duo Hobbs & Shaw suddenly had their very own spinoff.

"Hobbs & Shaw" initially seems like it will have just enough plot to hang the action on:  rogue MI6 agent Hattie Shaw (Vanessa Kirby, Netflix's The Crown) steals a deadly virus, and Hobbs and Shaw, after a mutual show of blustering reticence, reluctantly pair up to track her down. Idris Elba ("The Mountain Between Us") turns up as cybernetically-enhanced uber-baddie Brixton, who's nursing a grudge against one of our heroes. Meanwhile, Hobbs and Shaw both wrangle with family-focused subplots (guess who's got a daughter? And guess who's got a sister!) and trade stingingly personalized comic insults while kicking ass and wrecking an alarming array of vehicles in pursuit of justice.

The Story

Stuart's take: "Hobbs & Shaw" is too long on action sequences and too short on a decent plot to connect them - but is anyone really watching these films for character development and complex storytelling?  No!  Audiences want Dwayne Johnson swaggering and manhandling bad guys while Jason Statham looks suave kicking someone in the face while holding someone else's throat. This what Johnson and Statham do; it's their brand and to be fair, they are good at delivering on it. And because it's a "Fast & Furious" (trademark, all rights reserved, but not part of the Disney content empire) film, there are plenty of fast and cool cars doing sweet powerslides off of buildings and jumping off mountains.  Let's agree to not judge this film too harshly with regard to suspension of disbelief - I think that car's been in the shop since "2 Fast 2 Furious."  But, I have to mention that we're not really treading any new narrative ground here: Super virus injected into loved one, check "Mission Impossible: 2." Bickering hero team, check "Lethal Weapon." Unstoppable cyborg bad guy? That's "The Terminator." Added together it feels a bit formulaic.

Lora's take: My "Hobbs & Shaw" journey went something like this: First half hour, "Wow, this is pretty tight. Johnson and Statham's buddy dynamic is strong and the action is moving right along; could wind up being a standout in the big-ticket action genre." 1.5 hours in: "Ok, have I lost a thread somewhere? A pretty major plot point just got underplayed to the point of "Blinked? You missed it!" That scene with Hobbs and Shaw competing to take out a bunch of bad guys was funny but played like a dress rehearsal that they dropped in without rewrites or final edits; good for laughs but really messed with the pacing." One hour, 45 mins: "How did this go from being a long-on-laughs buddy comedy to a super-earnest outing where people stand on a beach at sunset making noble pronouncements about going into battle?" Two hours and 10 mins: "How the hell am I still watching this movie??"

The Cast

Stuart's take: I found a surprising amount of enjoyment from some interesting and solid supporting characters and cameos that delivered well.  In one case, it's another "that guy doing his thing" sort of performance, but like Johnson and Statham, "that guy's" brand works pretty well.

Particular credit is due to the great chemistry between Johnson and Statham.  This may not be the first bickering buddy action movie, nor the best, but they work quite well together.  Add in Vanessa Kirby as a foil to both of them - she does a great job keeping up and not ALWAYS being the damsel in distress - and you have a solid trio.  Lastly, there's a (well-advertised) scene where Brixton refers to himself as ‘Black Superman,' and Idris Elba embodies that line, he's chewing on ALL the scenery and savoring its delicious flavors.  He's a great villain and I sincerely hope he can have more opportunities like this in future.

Lora's take: Dwayne Johnson and Idris Elba both reside on my "I'll watch them in (almost) anything" list, but I'm not much of a Jason Statham fan. I didn't particularly warm up to him this time around, though the Johnson-Statham chemistry is pretty undeniable. Statham stays in his fairly narrow lane here; he proves to be a solid straight man for Johnson's looser comedic approach, and he delivers some solid zingers of his own. I have a problem with Statham's growling one-note delivery and his tendency to swallow dialogue, but on the other hand, the "Fast & Furious" franchise isn't exactly known for asking its cast to deliver soliloquies.

"Hobbs & Shaw's" cameos provide three well-known actors the chance to add their spin to the franchise, and it's clear that they each had loads of fun with their bits. And, let's talk Idris Elba: he totally owns the role of Brixton, and if he's never destined to become James Bond, this turn argues strongly that he'd make one hell of a Bond villain.

The Action

Stuart's take: I must give full marks to truly excellent fight choreography across the board. Everyone who throws a punch in "Hobbs & Shaw" is given something to do that matches their skillsets.  And most importantly, the handheld shaky-cam is used judiciously. But the nonstop action becomes a bit samey, and even tiresome, over the span of the film's two hour and 15 minute runtime.  And it is lacking in that "Whoa!" moment that sticks with you after the credits start to roll.  Again, this is where a bit more story might have helped to really build a narrative reason to care for this awesome display of guns, muscles, cars, and explosions.

Lora's take: I agree with Stuart on the fight choreography; the action scenes in general are where "Hobbs & Shaw" really shines, even when those sequences become increasingly improbable and finally top out in the realm of cartoonish. But even in their most logic-defying stretches there are still grounding elements: characters get banged up, and you see the impact of gravity and physics when vehicles impact surfaces. There's also a fun "play along" element here as our heroes weaponize a startling array of regular household items on their hunt for the bad guys: I tallied a champagne bottle, a toaster, a shower head, and a car battery just for starters.

The Jokes

Lora's take: I am sucker for Dwayne Johnson, and his charm is in full effect in pretty much every frame of "Hobbs & Shaw." His humor generally lands for me, and I laughed out loud at most of the traded insults, which got more complex and baroque as the movie went on. Johnson is a pro with the funny reaction shot, and while his comic timing is sometimes a little on the nose, there's something so inviting in the way that he sells a joke that you feel like he's letting you in on something rather than pitching at you.

Stuart's take: The film spends no time establishing why Hobbs and Shaw don't get along (Viewers: you have seen the rest of the franchise, right?  At least all the trailers make it clear, right?) yet proceeds to punch that joke in the face again and again and again and...you get the idea.  Some of those punches land, but others feel like leftovers thrown at the writer's room walls.  Most disappointing is the lack of variety - it's somewhat reminiscent of the insult contest from "The Sandlot." It's possible that they may have been able to hit those beats more effectively with better overall pacing. Even though the central premise joke wears quickly, there are actually many good laughs throughout the film - in particular from some of the supporting characters.

Odds & Ends

Stuart's take: On the subject of violence, this is an oddly sterile film. There are countless head trauma and deaths by gunshot and blunt object, but there's almost no blood to be found. I pondered the implications of this while watching the remixed and sanitized "Once Upon a Deadpool," where I suspect it was part of the joke.  I'm not saying that "Hobbs & Shaw" needed to be ultraviolent and gory, but this just feels weird for some reason.

As an aside, there is no gene pool on earth where Cliff Curtis and Dwayne Johnson are brothers.

Lora's take: The first 20 minutes of "Hobbs & Shaw" plays like it was shot on location in a W Hotel lobby; it's all purple neon with an aggressively high-end clubby aesthetic. Thankfully that gives way before too long, but at the other end of the spectrum the last half hour of the film feels like it was grafted on from some other screenplay entirely. There are two films here and they meet awkwardly somewhere in the middle; the results are entertaining but overlong, and some major editing at the screenplay stage could have produced a leaner, tighter film that retained the action, humor, and family drama without the occasionally self-indulgent bloat.

Snarky parting observation: resisting the urge to punch up the action using slo-mo shots could have cut 20 damn minutes off of this film's behemoth running time.

Bottom Line

Fast & Furious & Hobbs & Shaw & Johnson & Statham; with that mix of elements, if you decide to take this ride, you probably already expect to witness a glorious study in excess. "Hobbs & Shaw" runs way too long, some of the funny bits are self-indulgently lengthy and throw off the pacing, and the attempt at melding action sequences and family drama gets less successful as the story proceeds. If you've stuck with the franchise for this long you're probably a fan of the charismatic lead performances and dazzling car chase sequences, and "Hobbs & Shaw" has more of that than any one moviegoer might be expected to handle. But then, you knew that when you strapped in and hit the gas going in, right?