The real challenge comes not from filming fast cars, but from respecting the life of those lost.
Originally, “Furious 7 “was not even supposed to be finished after the death of Paul Walker (who played Brian O’Connor in the series) in the fall of 2013. The film was sidelined halfway through, but production resumed with the use of stand-ins.
In accordance with a main theme of the series, family, the production staff of the Fast and Furious series struggled to find a balance between respecting Walker’s legacy, and launching the film. The result was the use of Walker’s brothers to film the rest of his scenes.
“It was great to honor the family by using [Walker’s] brothers as stand-ins. I don’t think it would have been a true tribute or respectful to his legacy to CGI him into the rest of the movie,” said Junior Jenny Brown.
This latest installment to the “Fast and Furious” franchise builds off of events from the previous movie, with Dominic Torretto and his crew trying to leave the mercenary life behind after defeating international terrorist Owen Shaw.
The sins of the past have come to haunt them, with Deckard (Jason Statham), Shaw’s older brother out killing the crew one-by-one for revenge. To add the typical drama of a FF movie, a Somalian terrorist called Jakarde, and a shady government official called “Mr. Nobody” are both competing to steal a computer terrorism program called God’s Eye, that can turn any technological device into a weapon. Torretto must reconvene with his team to stop Shaw and retrieve the God’s Eye program while caught in a power struggle between terrorist and the United States government.
The action flick was extremely successful in theaters, becoming a critical and commercial success almost overnight, with praise being aimed at the film’s action sequences and its tribute to Walker. It made $392.2 million worldwide in its first three days of release, which is the fourth-highest opening of all time. It has grossed over $800 million at the box office, making it the highest-grossing film in the franchise after just twelve days, the highest-grossing film of 2015, and the 45th highest-grossing film of all time.
What’s next for the franchise following this success and the death of Walker? Will they try to bring Torretto’s squad up onto the big screen for an eighth time, or would it be better to exit on a successful note?
“The franchise has completely transformed the racing-action genre, if they were to make more movies it would ruin the series, they should leave it at seven [installments],” said Brown.