The Fast and the Furious was so good, I felt the need to register and share my views of the movie, thats how good it is

Rating: 8/10 (23 June 2001)

Don't let anyone fool you, the Fast and the Furious is a wonderfully entertaining movie. If you saw the trailer and though that it looked like a fun roller coaster ride styled action movie then you are absolutely correct. The best summation you could give of the film is that its like two hours of what you see in the trailer. It's seriously one of the most accurately advertised and needless to say one of the most fun and entertaining movies of the year.
The racing scenes have been cleverly filmed and edited together in a way that gives you a false sense of motion with lots of first person views as cars race down the street. In addition, just about every scene in the movie looks really sharp thanks to nice lighting, some visual effects, and just plain good camera work. The direction of camera work for the most part is very traditional in the sense that each major scene is proceeded by a few seconds of a `set up' shot that gives you a feeling for the size and surroundings of a scene locale. The majority of the dialogue shots and racing shots are of course third person, however, many of these shots are extremely tight giving you a very strong sense of being there.

Vin Diesel's performance is convincing and very entertaining. He's extremely enigmatic and seems to have that quality that some actors like Bruce Willis have. That quality of coming off as being an extremely cool person who you just know you'd be best friends with. Paul Walker's performance while somewhat wooden, really isn't bad at all. In fact if you really stopped and thought about his character's motivation Paul's on screen apprehension and uncertainty early in the film actually fits his character. Stack that up against his wide eyed and completely commanding on screen presence toward the end of the film and you've got the complete emotional stages of his character that realistically depicts a man in his situation. The rest of the main cast really deserves a lot of credit too. Sure they might not be a lot well known actors, but I'd have to imagine that a few of them will be after a few casting agents see this movie since there really isn't a bad performance in the movie.
The writing and dialogue is fairly decent. Sure it isn't the most original story ever, but it does a great job of delivering a plot through the use of a lot of action. The dialogue while a bit awkward a couple of times is for the most part well done.
In the end, you won't be disappointed in The Fast and the Furious if you like action movies, cars, or Vin Diesel. The story is decent, the sound and visuals are fantastic, and you'll walk out of the theater with a big smile and the undying urge to drive really reckless while listening to loud music. The PG-13 rating is a very liberal one by the way, people shoot and are shot by guns on screen, some language, some slight skin, but since the movie moves so fast and is so loud, you really think you hear and see more than you actually do. Great movie!