Revenge Done Quick and Dirty: Faster
Faster, directed by George Tillman Jr. with performances by Dwayne Johnson (The Rock), Billy Bob Thornton and Carla Gugino. This is a revenge film, and when I heard the old school music in the opening of the film, this opened the door in my mind that Faster should be seen as a grindhouse/exploitation type of movie.
The film doesn’t promise much other than you have a set of killers in the film. Many of them are in plain sight. They are all on the unbalanced side. It does point out very quickly that not everything is on the level, and revenge is not pretty in the least.
He drives and he shoots people. "Driver" is an apt name for the protagonist.
Johnson plays a character with no real name (Driver) in the story that is double crossed, and his partner in crime (his brother) is killed execution style. Driver lives, and goes to prison. Johnson’s character is very much a straightforward killer with a Terminator-esque efficiency when it comes to exacting revenge. Case in point when the protag discovers one of the targets is in the hospital in critical condition, he shows up in the hospital and murders him. Such cold-blooded dedication to revenge gives him a coldness the character needs to pull off these murders.
The secondary characters have some interesting aspects to them well. Billy Bob Thornton as a crooked cop is more than interesting. He does drugs, married his snitch, and has that touch of “I fuck up a lot, and I’m barely functional.” It’s not too hard to see where he gets tangled in this revenge plot. I dare say the film tried to humanize the character by showing his domestic woes, with a son, and a wife who has drug issues in spite of turning her life around. Whatever pity I held for Thornton’s character dies with him in this film. The man is pure sleaze, but we know that from the beginning of the film.
Thorton, "The Cop" is sleazy and Gugino (as Cicero) is stuck with him.
More can be said about the killer who hunts Driver. He’s clearly beaten a lot of personal issues to become a wealthy man. He however, needs a thrill out of life, and becomes an assassin. His success has turned to psychosis. If one looks at him, his character, no matter how refined and determined he is, he’s obsessed with killing. In a way he becomes the mirror image of Johnson’s character. He’s willing to hunt and kill, when all he really wants is recognition for his skill from his prey. Surprisingly, his arrogance does not get him killed.
Interesting that the main characters have no names. It may suggest they lost their humanity, and therefore should not be known by real names. By contrast, Gugino (as Cicero) is the only character who displays some humanity, and isn’t in on the crimes. She also has a name.
One of the best scenes in the movie is when our protag runs into a man on his hit list who has turned his life over to God. I did expect that the man would be killed, regardless. What I liked it the conversion over to God was sincere. The original double cross showed that he got in over his head, did wrong and repents. Slyly the character’s presence is heard throughout this film. It’s not until Johnson and this character meet do we see how and why.
There is no happy ending in this film, no character to “change” Johsnon’s character’s life with love and support. It is abrupt and ugly, as revenge can often be.
