“FAST & FURIOUS PRESENTS: HOBBS & SHAW” — 3 stars — Dwayne Johnson, Jason Statham, Idris Elba, Vanessa Kirby; PG-13 (prolonged sequences of action and violence, suggestive material and some strong language); in general release; running time: 135 minutes
SALT LAKE CITY — “Fast & Furious Presents: Hobbs & Shaw” is an absurd title for an absurd movie. It’s also a pretty fun movie, with loads of action, mayhem and Dwayne Johnson.
The verbose title of David Leitch’s film is also a funny reminder of how this over-the-top international action spy thriller spinoff is rooted in a Southern California street racing movie from the early 2000s. It’s problematic, too, because for all its strengths, “Hobbs & Shaw” can’t quite match the charm of its parent franchise.
“Hobbs & Shaw” pairs up well-known characters from the “Fast & Furious” series. Luke Hobbs (Johnson) is the larger-than-life lawman, originally brought on to hunt a street racing crew of charismatic criminals before eventually becoming their unlikely ally. Deckard Shaw (Jason Statham) is a disgraced former MI6 agent who originally tried to hunt down and murder the same crew, and partially succeeded (R.I.P. Han), but somehow got turned into a good guy — or at least an antihero — by 2017’s “The Fate of the Furious.”
The film follows the bald alpha bros as they chase down a world-threatening virus. Dubbed “snowflake,” presumably because it targets the weaker segment of the population first, the virus is a next-gen superweapon designed by Eteon, a nefarious organization bent on evolving the human race by whatever technological and/or murderous means necessary. Eteon’s efforts are spearheaded by a bio-enhanced super soldier named Brixton (Idris Elba), who is also a former MI6 operative.
We meet Brixton as his team attempts to recover the virus from an MI6 operative named Hattie (Vanessa Kirby), who is actually still on the payroll. In desperation, Hattie injects the dormant virus into her own bloodstream before disappearing off the grid. Then the CIA recruits Hobbs and Shaw to track down Hattie. Hobbs’ motivation is to save the world; Shaw’s motivation is a little different: Hattie is his sister.
It doesn’t take long before Hobbs and Shaw locate Hattie, and eventually the film becomes a race against time as the trio tries to extract the virus before Brixton can get to them. This predictably leads to a globetrotting series of spectacular — and increasingly unbelievable — action sequences, with enough pyrotechnics to earn its place in the “Fast & Furious” family canon.
Brixton is a solid baddie, even if Elba’s character — jokingly dubbed “black Superman” — is a little redundant given that Johnson and Statham’s characters already behave as if they are superhuman. One early sequence where Johnson fights grunts while freefalling down the side of a skyscraper is a perfect illustration of “Hobbs & Shaw’s” tenuous balance between cool and ridiculous.
The pressure from Brixton offsets the tension between the leads, who spend most of the movie trying to trip up the other’s efforts, or just improvising the most creative ways to insult each other’s manhood. This adds some fun, if mindless, entertainment value to the production — often Leitch shoots the actors giving googly-eyes straight to camera for enhanced comic effect — but even Johnson and Statham’s obvious chemistry pales next to the camp that fans have become used to in the other films, which usually involves Vin Diesel drinking Coronas and mumbling something about family.
What makes the “Fast & Furious” movies work is the way they combine unabashedly unbelievable stunts and action sequences with the sense that everyone is having a good time and that the audience is in on the fun. “Fast & Furious Presents: Hobbs & Shaw” veers a bit more toward the traditional action-movie formula, and for the most part it works. It might be worth a sequel or two, but it’s still got some work to do if the spinoff is going to beat Diesel and company in the quarter mile.
Rating explained: “Fast & Furious Presents: Hobbs & Shaw” is rated PG-13 for considerable action violence and mayhem, colorful adult dialogue and profanity (including a single use of the F-word), and some sexual content (though not as persistent or gratuitous as in the "Fast & Furious" movies).