Furious 7
Furious 7
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Furious 7 | |
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Theatrical release poster
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Directed by | James Wan |
Produced by |
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Written by | Chris Morgan |
Based on | Characters by Gary Scott Thompson |
Starring | |
Music by | Brian Tyler |
Cinematography |
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Edited by |
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Production
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Distributed by | Universal Pictures |
Release dates
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Running time
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137 minutes[1] |
Country | United States[2] |
Language | English |
Budget | $190 million[3][4][5] |
Box office | $1.512 billion[6] |
With the previous three installments set between 2 Fast 2 Furious (2003) and The Fast and the Furious: Tokyo Drift (2006), Furious 7 is the first installment in the franchise to take place after Tokyo Drift. The film also marks the final film appearance of Walker, who died in a single-vehicle accident on November 30, 2013, with filming only half-completed.[9] Following Walker's death, filming was delayed for script rewrites, and his brothers, Caleb and Cody, were used among others as stand-ins to complete his remaining scenes.[10]
Plans for a seventh installment were first announced in February 2012 when Johnson stated that production on the film would begin after the completion of Fast & Furious 6. In April 2013, Wan, predominantly known for horror films, was announced to direct the film in place of Justin Lin, who left the franchise after directing the previous three installments. Casting began in the same month with the re-signing of Diesel and Walker, and an initial release date was set. Principal photography began in Atlanta, Georgia, in September 2013, resumed in April 2014 and ended in July 2014, with other filming locations including Los Angeles, Colorado, Abu Dhabi and Tokyo.
Furious 7 premiered in Los Angeles on April 1, 2015, and was first released in Australia on April 2, 2015, and then in the United States on April 3, 2015. The film was also released in 3D, IMAX 3D and 4DX internationally. Upon release, the film became a critical and commercial success, with praise being aimed at the film's action sequences and its tribute to Walker. The film grossed $397.6 million worldwide in its first five days of release, which is the third highest-grossing opening of all time. The film has grossed over $1.5 billion worldwide, making it the highest-grossing film in the franchise after just twelve days, the second highest-grossing film of 2015 (behind Jurassic World) and the fifth highest-grossing film of all time. A sequel is scheduled to be released on April 14, 2017.
Contents
Plot
After defeating Owen Shaw and his crew and securing amnesty for their past crimes, Dominic "Dom" Toretto, Brian O'Conner, and the rest of their team have returned to the United States to live normal lives again. Brian begins to accustom himself to life as a father, while Dom tries to help Letty Ortiz regain her memories. Meanwhile, Owen's older brother, Deckard Shaw, breaks into the secure hospital the comatose Owen is being held in and swears vengeance against Dom, before breaking into Luke Hobbs' DSS office to extract profiles of Dom's crew. After revealing his identity, Shaw engages Hobbs in a fight, and escapes when he detonates a bomb that severely injures Hobbs. Dom later learns from his sister Mia that she is pregnant again and convinces her to tell Brian. However, a bomb, disguised in a package sent from Tokyo, explodes and destroys the Toretto house just seconds after Han, a member of their team, is killed by Shaw in Tokyo. Dom later visits Hobbs in a hospital, where he learns that Shaw is a rogue special forces assassin seeking to avenge his brother. Dom then travels to Tokyo to claim Han's body, where he meets and races Sean Boswell, a friend of Han's, who gives him personal items found at Han's crash site.Back at Han's funeral in Los Angeles, Dom notices a car observing and chases after the vehicle, driven by Shaw. Both prepare to fight, but Shaw slips away when a covert ops team arrives, led by Frank Petty. Petty says that he will assist Dom in stopping Shaw if he helps him obtain the God's Eye, a computer program that uses digital devices to track down a person, and save its creator, a hacker named Ramsey, from a mercenary named Jakande. Dom, Brian, Letty, Roman Pearce, and Tej Parker then airdrop their cars over the Caucasus Mountains in Azerbaijan, ambush Jakande's convoy, and rescue Ramsey. The team then heads to Abu Dhabi, where a billionaire has acquired the flash drive containing the God's Eye, and manages to steal it. With the God's Eye, the team manages to track down Shaw, who is waiting at a remote factory. Dom, Brian, Petty and his team attempt to capture Shaw, but are ambushed by Jakande and his militants, and they are forced to flee while Jakande obtains the God's Eye. At his own request, Petty is then left to be evacuated by helicopter. Left with no other choice, the team decides to return to Los Angeles to fight Shaw, Jakande and his men on their home turf. Meanwhile, Brian promises Mia that once they deal with Shaw, he'll dedicate himself to their family full-time.
While Jakande pursues Brian and the rest of the team with a stealth attack helicopter and drone, Ramsey attempts to hack into the God's Eye while sharing her mobile between their vehicles. Hobbs, seeing the team in trouble, breaks out of hospital and destroys the drone. Ramsey then regains control of the God's Eye and shuts it down. Meanwhile, Dom and Shaw engage in a one-on-one brawl on a parking garage, before Jakande intervenes and attacks them both, and Shaw is defeated when part of the parking garage collapses beneath him. Dom then launches his vehicle at Jakande's helicopter, tossing a bag of grenades onto its skids, before injuring himself when his car lands and crashes. Hobbs then shoots the bag of grenades from ground level, destroying the helicopter and killing Jakande. When Dom remains unconscious, the team fears that he is dead. As Letty cradles Dom's body in her arms, she reveals that she has regained her memories, and that she remembers their wedding. Dom regains consciousness soon after, remarking, "It's about time".
Later, Shaw is taken into custody by Hobbs and locked away in a secret, high-security prison. Meanwhile, at a beach, Brian and Mia play with their son while Dom, Letty, Roman, Tej and Ramsey observe, acknowledging that Brian is better off retired with his family. Dom silently leaves, but Brian catches up with him at a stop sign. As Dom remembers the times that he had had with Brian, they bid each other farewell and drive off in separate directions.
Cast
For more details on the characters, see List of The Fast and the Furious characters.
- Vin Diesel as Dominic Toretto, a former criminal and professional street racer who has retired and settled down with his wife, Letty.
- Paul Walker as Brian O'Conner, a former FBI agent-turned-criminal and professional street racer. He is Mia's partner, with whom he has a son, Jack.
- Caleb and Cody Walker, Paul's younger brothers, were used among others as stand-ins to complete his remaining scenes following their brother's death in a single-vehicle accident on November 30, 2013.[10]
- Dwayne Johnson as Luke Hobbs, a DSS agent who allied with Dom and his team after their outings in Rio de Janeiro and Europe. It is later revealed that he is also a father, to a young girl. Johnson initially said that if Universal Pictures pursued the accelerated development of a seventh film beginning in the summer, he would be unable to participate due to scheduling conflicts with filming on Hercules.[11] However, as production for the film would commence in September, he confirmed his return for the film, as Hercules would complete production in time to enable him to film a significant part.[12]
- Michelle Rodriguez as Letty Ortiz, Dom's wife and a professional street racer, who was revealed to have suffered from amnesia after being presumed dead in Fast & Furious.
- Tyrese Gibson as Roman Pearce, a member of Dom's team and a childhood friend of Brian.
- Chris Bridges as Tej Parker, a mechanic and technician, and a friend of Brian and Roman's from Miami.
- Jordana Brewster as Mia Toretto, Dom's younger sister and a former member of his team. She is Brian's partner, with whom she has a son, Jack.
- Djimon Hounsou as Mose Jakande, a Somalian mercenary and terrorist who leads an a private military company that allies with Shaw and uses the God's Eye to track its creator and use her to track down his enemies.[13]
- Kurt Russell as Frank Petty[14] (also known as "Mr Nobody"), the leader of a covert ops team who agrees to help Dom stop Shaw if he can help him prevent Jakande from obtaining a computer program called the God's Eye.
- Jason Statham as Deckard Shaw, a rogue special forces assassin seeking to avenge his comatose younger brother after his demise at the hands of Dom and his team in Spain.
- Nathalie Emmanuel as Ramsey, a British computer hacktivist and the creator of the God's Eye, who allies with Dom and his team after being saved from Jakande and helps them to regain control of her program.[13]
- Tony Jaa as Kiet, a member of Jakande's team who possesses great agility, athleticism and fighting prowess. Thai martial arts actor Jaa was confirmed to have joined the cast in August 2013, making his Hollywood debut.[15][16]
- Ronda Rousey as Kara, the Head of Security for an Abu Dhabi billionaire. Rousey's involvement was confirmed in August 2013. Having committed to The Expendables 3 at the same time (along with Russell, who later pulled out, and Statham), Rousey was forced to shoot both films back-to-back in order to allow herself 45 days to focus on training for her UFC championship rematch against Miesha Tate. Her participation in the film was similar to that of Gina Carano making the transition from mixed martial arts fighting to acting, following Carano's involvement in Fast & Furious 6.[17]
- Lucas Black as Sean Boswell, a professional street racer and drifter based in Tokyo, who meets Dom when he travels to Tokyo to claim the body of Han, a mutual friend of theirs killed by Shaw. In September, it was confirmed that Black had signed on to reprise his role as Boswell for Furious 7 and two more installments.[18][19]
- Elsa Pataky as Elena Neves, a DSS agent and former Rio police officer who moved to the United States to become Hobbs' new partner at the DSS.
- Ali Fazal as Safar, a friend of Ramsey to whom she sent the God's Eye for safekeeping. It is Fazal's first appearance in an American film. He described his role as a cameo.[20]
- John Brotherton as Sheppard, Petty's right-hand man.[13][21][22][23]
Production
Development
On October 21, 2011, the Los Angeles Times reported that Universal Studios was considering filming two sequels—Fast Six and Fast Seven—back-to-back with a single storyline running through both films. Both would be written by Chris Morgan and directed by Justin Lin, who had been the franchise's writer and director, respectively, since The Fast and the Furious: Tokyo Drift (2006).[27] On December 20, 2011, following the release of Fast Five, Vin Diesel stated that Fast Six would be split into two parts, with writing for the two films occurring simultaneously. On the decision, Diesel said:[28]We have to pay off this story, we have to service all of these character relationships, and when we started mapping all that out it just went beyond 110 pages ... The studio said, 'You can't fit all that story in one damn movie!'[28]However, in an interview on February 15, 2012, Dwayne Johnson stated that the two intended sequels would no longer be filmed simultaneously because of weather issues in filming locations, and that production on Fast Seven would only begin after the completion of Fast Six.[29]
In April 2013, during post-production of the retitled Fast & Furious 6, Lin announced that he would not return to direct a seventh film, as the studio wanted to produce the film on an accelerated schedule for release in summer 2014. This would have required Lin to begin pre-production on the sequel while performing post-production on Fast & Furious 6, which he considered would affect the quality of the final product. Despite the usual two-year gap between the previous installments, Universal chose to pursue a sequel quicker due to having fewer reliable franchises than its competitor studios.[30] However, subsequent interviews with Lin have suggested that the sixth film was always intended to be the final installment directed by him.[31]
In April 2013, Australian director James Wan, predominantly known for horror films, was announced as the sequel's director, with Neal H. Moritz and Michael Fottrell returning to produce and Morgan returning to write the script, his fifth in the franchise. On April 16, 2013, Diesel announced that the sequel would be released on July 11, 2014.[32] In May 2013, Diesel said that the sequel would feature Los Angeles, Tokyo and the Middle East as locations.[33][34]
Filming
Principal photography began in early September 2013 in Atlanta, Georgia, with a casting call issued.[35][36] Abu Dhabi was also a filming location;[37] the production crew chose it over Dubai, as they would benefit from the Emirate's 30% rebate scheme.[38] Pikes Peak Highway in Colorado was closed in September to film some driving sequences.[39]On September 16, the production filmed with Paul Walker and the Kimsey twins, playing his son, Jack,[40] in front of an Atlanta elementary school.[41] Han's funeral scene was filmed at Oakland Cemetery,[42] with extras needed for the scene being "hot, hip and trendy cool types of all ethnicities between the ages of 18 and 45".[43] On the evening of September 19, Lucas Black joined the production[44] for his sole scene with Diesel, in an Atlanta parking garage. Separate scenes with Walker also shot in the same location on the same night,[45] including one half of a phone conversation between his character and Jordana Brewster's. The day after, Diesel posted a picture from the night shoot with Black on his Facebook page.[46]
On October 24, over a month into the film's production, Johnson tweeted he had started shooting for the film after wrapping up on Hercules.[47] Five days later, Diesel posted the first photo of Johnson on the set, in the hospital scene.[48]
On November 30, 2013, while on a break for the Thanksgiving holiday, Walker, who portrayed Brian O'Conner, died in a single-vehicle accident.[49][50] The next day, Universal announced that production would continue after a delay that would allow the filmmakers to rework the film.[51] On December 4, 2013, Universal put production on hold indefinitely.[52] Wan later confirmed that the film had not been cancelled.[53][54][55] On December 22, 2013, Diesel announced on his Facebook page that the film would be released on April 10, 2015.[56] On February 27, 2014, The Hollywood Reporter reported that filming would resume on April 1, and that the cast and crew had headed to Atlanta to prepare for about eight more weeks of shooting.[57] Principal photography ended on July 10, 2014.[7]
Stunts
The scene featuring Brian jumping off a bus off a cliff was performed by a stuntman and was all done without any computer graphics.[64] The shooting for this particular sequence along with the scene in which Dom and his team are pursuing to rescue Ramsey almost didn't happen due to the absence of tax break in Colorado.[64] The studio originally wanted to shoot the sequence in Georgia which provides tax breaks for film productions, and then they'd add woods in the background later in post production to which Razatos denied saying, "the audience is going to know [it's CGI] and aren't going to feel good about it."[64] Shooting finally took place in Colorado.[64]
A total of 340 cars were used in the film,[63] and more than 230 cars were destroyed in the making of the film including several black Mercedes-Benz, a Ford Crown Victoria and a Mitsubishi Montero.[65] The mountain-highway chase scene on Colorado's Monarch Pass proved to be the most damaging sequence with over 40 vehicles being destroyed.[65][66] Only 10 percent of the action sequences in the film were computer-generated, and even then, much of the CGI was employed simply to erase the wires and other contraptions that were used to film real cars and drivers or to add a background.[63] It took more than 3,500 man-days to complete the various stunts of the film.[63] For safety reasons, stunt coordinator, Joel Kramer said that he doesn't let his drivers go above 50 miles per hour.[67]
Redevelopment of Walker's character
"When I first heard the news, I was shell-shocked like everyone, and
it took me days to come to terms with it. And then after that,
heartbreaks started sinking in and we realised that Paul [Walker] wasn’t
going to be around with us anymore moving forward, and it was a really
hard one. And finishing the movie was the last thing on my mind at that
point. It was more the idea of... picking up the pieces, going back on
set, rallying the team, the cast, and the crew, and as the director,
having to put on the brave face and champion and push everyone along.
The idea of that was very daunting for me, but it became very apparent
to all of us that we needed to finish this movie to honour Paul’s legacy
and to basically honour his memories... it was about making this movie
for Paul."
Music
Main articles: Furious 7 (soundtrack) and Furious 7 (score)
The musical score was composed by Brian Tyler, who scored the third, fourth, and fifth installments of the series.[74] "There's an emotional component to Fast & Furious 7 that is unique", said Tyler about his experience scoring. "I think people are really going to be amazed by it."[75] A soundtrack album to the film was released by Atlantic Records on March 17, 2015.[76]Songs featured in the film include:
- "Go Hard or Go Home" (Wiz Khalifa & Iggy Azalea)[77]
- "Ride Out" (Kid Ink, Tyga, Wale, YG & Rich Homie Quan)[78]
- "See You Again" (Wiz Khalifa and Charlie Puth)
- "My Angel" (Prince Royce)
- "Hamdulillah" (The Narcicyst feat. Shadia Mansour)
- "Get Low" (Dillon Francis and DJ Snake)
- "Ay Vamos" (J Balvin feat. Nicky Jam and French Montana)
Release
The film, which began principal photography in September 2013, was originally designed as a Summer 2014 release. It was put on hold following the fatal car crash that claimed Paul Walker's life on November 30, 2013. The production resumed in April 2014. In October 2014, Universal revealed that the film was officially titled Furious 7,[79] and that the debut trailer would be released during an interactive fan event over social media. In the days leading up to the event, seven-second, behind-the-scenes videos were released, titled "7 Seconds of 7".[79] On February 1, 2015, a new trailer featuring all-new footage debuted during Super Bowl XLIX.The film was originally scheduled for release on April 10, 2015, but it was announced that the film's release date had been brought forward a week to April 3, 2015. The official announcement in change of date was made in July 2014.[80] Fast and Furious 7 premiered at the SXSW Film Festival at 12:07 a.m. at Austin's Paramount Theatre on March 16, 2015.[81] On March 27, 2015, a free standalone expansion for the video game Forza Horizon 2, titled Forza Horizon 2 Presents Fast & Furious, was released to help promote the film.[82] For its global premiere at the TCL Chinese Theatre in Los Angeles on April 1, 2015, IMAX Corporation installed a new laser projection which was the first such installation in the U.S. and the second worldwide, following The Hobbit: The Battle of Five Armies, which opened at Scotiabank Theatre in Toronto in December 2014.[83]
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