The Rock, The Statham, The Elba, David Leitch, Fast&Furious-franchise.. how do you NOT get your hopes up!? I was kind of expecting (although I tried not to) the action movie of the year, if not decade. Was it? Uh-well.
This movie is really self aware. It knows exactly what it is. And that is a good thing. It is slightly cheesy at times, but nothing problematic. It does have some awesome action, but what sells it even more is the chemistry between The Rock and Statham. I actually didn't expect the banter, or quarreling between them to be as entertaining as it was. But it was, and got quite a few laughs from the others at the press screening.
Some of the action is over the top, but some of it is more grounded. One of the bigger action scenes has some shaky cam.. why Leitch, WHY? Well, because it is suppose to come off as more hectic, I guess. I can almost accept that.
For the most part the action is pretty clean, though. There is quite a bit of fighting, and it's pretty enjoyable. Not really anything mind blowing, but decent.
Some of the more over the top action scenes has some CGI.. Slightly sloppy in a place or two. Also I'm not a big fan of the technology we see with one of the characters, this isn't the future. With that said though, technology is moving very fast these days, so I'll let it go.
Idris Elba is good, and holy crap is he one handsome SOB! Vanessa Kirby has some action scenes as well, btw.
I almost haven't seen any trailers, so I don't know if it's in there, but there were a couple of cameos almost, from famous actors, and that was a pleasant surprise for me.
All in all this is a solid action movie, with a good deal of comedy. I'll watch it again at some time, only then will I truly know how good it was.
Critic:AAA