Review: The Fate of the Furious

* * 1/2
Director: F. Gary Gray
Starring: Vin Diesel, Dwayne Johnson, Michelle Rodriguez, Charlize Theron, Jason Statham

Even when grading on the generous curve you have to allow for the movies from the Fast and Furious series, which aim for nothing more than the simplest entertainment and the most instant of gratifications, the latest entry is just a bit of a disappointment. The Fate of the Furious (how is it not called The F8 of the Furious? Was that too obvious even for this series?) is an over-stuffed entry in a series that was already pretty well-stuffed and which pretty thoroughly disappears up itself by playing around with its mythology rather than continuing to build it out - to say nothing of the fact that its villain is such a non-entity that it almost seems like Charlize Theron just popped by over a weekend to film some scenes for the hell of it. But, still, it's about the action, right? The action is pretty good, though it leaves you wondering where, if each entry in the series is to have bigger action than the last, the series has left to go with the two (at least) films it has planned for the future.

Review: Central Intelligence (2016)

* * 1/2
Director: Rawson Marshall Thurber
Starring: Kevin Hart, Dwayne Johnson

Central Intelligence looks like it was a lot of fun to make. I'm not sure it's ever quite as much fun to watch, but I'm glad that some millionaires got to have a good time. Though the film is sometimes quite funny, it's also strangely inert given the high volume of action sequences spread throughout, and it inspired nothing more in me than indifference. Though indifference is probably better than massive disappointment, which is what I would have felt had I realized beforehand that its director, Rawson Marshall Thurber, is also the director of Dodgeball, a movie as silly as it is funny and had the benefit of Vince Vaughan at the height of his powers. Central Intelligence has the benefit of Dwayne Johnson and Kevin Hart at the height of their powers, but somehow never makes as much of them as it could. Maybe next time will be better, and there certainly will be a next time given that Central Intelligence made a whole lot of money during the summer when just about nothing seemed to make quite enough money.