A big movie and a fun time!

Rating: 8/10 (24 May 2013)

Well, this was unexpected! Going into this film I found myself with no hype at all. I expected a good, fun and cheesy movie time and I came out of the theater happy and surprised. While this isn't a masterpiece of filmmaking it does achieve what it sets out to do. To entertain you. And it does this quite good and sometimes it goes further than this by showing us some amazing set pieces and action sequences. For example one car, tank chase sequence! This is achieved by the gigantic production value of the film. You can literally smell the money that comes out of these guys. The whole movie you have this sense of scale, and I mean BIG scale! The amazing sound mixing and design including the music pumps you up and puts you in the mood! While the acting isn't Oscar worthy it is very fluid and it doesn't always feel forced. The chemistry between the cast is very solid and credible. Diesel and "The Rock" where pretty solid along with the secondary characters, and the villain was surprisingly tolerable. Another thing that solidifies the movie are the effects. These are outstanding along with the camera-work! The things that brought the movie down for me a little bit where some of the stunts, and weirdly some of these I found pretty amazing but although I understand this movie isn't supposed to be taken seriously there were some stunts that were just plain unbelievable, specially in the third act of the movie. And finally, the plot. While not groundbreaking it did have its interesting points but it doesn't drift away from the cheese factors. Overall I was quite surprised by what this movie did and how the director and producers exploited and used their huge production value. This is an example of a good quality action flick.