2006 | Dir. Justin Lin | 104 Minutes
"Life's simple, you make choices and you don't look back."
17-year-old Sean Boswell is forced in with his father, a US Naval officer stationed in Tokyo, after getting in trouble with the law for drag racing. Sean quickly befriends Twinkie, another American transplant who introduces him to the Tokyo drift racing scene. After Sean is soundly beaten by the thuggish "Drift King," a cocky street racer with Yakuza ties, DK's mysterious business partner Han Seoul-Oh takes him under his wing. After his girlfriend begins to fall for Sean and having discovered that Han had been stealing from him, DK goes after Sean and Han with explosive consequences.
Though the premise reads like a desperate attempt to reboot a franchise in tailspin, director Justin Lin breathes new life into the fledgling series taking the action to the neon-lit streets of Tokyo with thrilling races that emphasize skill over pure speed. The racing scenes in this film are stylish and exciting featuring creative stunts and mind-bending turns that utilize the art of drifting. The centerpiece of the film is a thrilling chase through the streets of Tokyo in which Sean, Han, and DK smoothly drift through a late night crowd in Shibuya Crossing shortly before Han meets a fiery end.
Lucas Black does a good enough a job as Sean, a flawed and slightly reckless heroic everyman, though he's never really allowed to elevate the role beyond what's on the page. The strongest player in the film is Sung Kang as the cool and collected Han, convincing as a slightly shifty racer with a criminal past. Brian Tee smirks/snarls through all of his scenes as the one-dimensional antagonist DK. Bow Wow is competent as the wheeling and dealing Twinkie who unfortunately has no identifiable character arc, while Australian actress Nathalie Kelley as Sean's love interest, Neela, is painfully standard through and through as is Brian Goodman as Sean's father.
Drifting further away from what made the first film so special, featuring none of the stars of the first two films (save for a brief cameo at the very end of the film), The Fast and the Furious: Tokyo Drift is a loose sequel with a flimsy premise that's barely saved by excellent action direction and a solid performance from Sung Kang. For sheer vehicular action, it's a notable improvement over 2 Fast 2 Furious, and a step in the right direction for the series.
FRAGMENTS
- The series' habit of assigning unconventional titles to its sequels continues here, the filmmakers opting to give this one a subtitle instead of a number (which may serve the series after all considering the fascinating trajectory it takes following the next film)
- In Japan, the title for this film is Wild Speed X3: Tokyo Drift
- Lucas Black will forever be known to me as the kid from Sling Blade and the boy that's infected by the black oil in the first minutes of The X-Files movie
- The final scene of the film features Vin Diesel reprising his role as Toretto, challenging Sean to a friendly race; Diesel agreed to make this cameo appearance for Universal in exchange for full ownership over the Riddick franchise he created with David Twohy (The Hollywood Reporter)
- Dom indicating that he considered Han part of his family, a marginal connection to the previous films at best, is a relationship that will be properly represented in the films that follow
- Zachery Ty Bryan, who played Brad Taylor on 1990's sitcom Home Improvement, has a small part as Clay, a high school bully who races against Sean at the start of the film
- Japanese screen legend Sonny Chiba plays Yakuza boss Kamata, star of the 1970's Street Fighter film series, ninja master Hattori Hanzo on Japanese television show Shadow Warriors (Kage no Gundan) a role that he spiritually reprises as Okinawan swordsmith Hattori Hanzo in Quentin Tarantino's Kill Bill
- Keiichi Tsuchiya, the real life "Drift King," makes a cameo appearance as a fisherman who provides snarky color commentary as Sean practices drifting on the pier
MCU CONNECTIONS
- Vin Diesel (Groot in Guardians of the Galaxy, Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 2, Avengers: Infinity War, Avengers: Endgame, Thor: Love and Thunder, and Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 3)
