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The third Fast and Furious movie is subtitled Tokyo Drift and features once again a third-rate rapper. This time Bow Wow plays the token black friend to the caucasian lead and goes by the name of Twink/Twinkie.
Let’s see what Urban Dictionary has to say about the meaning of “Twink”.
An attractive, boyish-looking, young gay man. The stereotypical twink is 18-22, slender with little or no body hair, often blonde, dresses in club wear even at 10:00 AM, and is not particularly intelligent. A twink is the gay answer to the blonde bimbo cheerleader.
And here I thought this movie was going to be less gay than the previous two.
While The Fast and the Furious: Tokyo Drift still has the same homosexual undertones it departs from the previous films in terms of cast and location. No longer sunny American scenery, but the neon of Tokyo. This movie deals with 17 year old Sean played by someone who’s clearly mid-20’s. He’s the guy that doesn’t have a lot of money and is ridiculed because of it. He also gets into trouble constantly because he stands up to his bullies, by racing them. Due to a severe crash and destroyed property Sean has two choices; either go to jail or live with his dad in Tokyo. I’m not sure if this was actually a deal or that he just fled the country.
Now we have the typical westerner in a foreign country plot, with all its cultural differences. Though he doesn’t speak a word Japanese it takes him less than 24 hours for him to get into street racing and meet up with two other foreign students; the aforementioned Twinkie and potential love interest Neela. But since this is Japan, it’s no surprise Neela’s current boyfriend DK (and that does not stand for Donkey Kong) has ties to the Yakuza. It’s also a bit racist that in a movie set in Tokyo, filled with beautiful Asian women, the female love interest is has a western look and talks with an Australian accent (In real life she’s from Peru).
The lead character Sean is from Alabama and talks with a southern slur. He sounded just like Forest Gump all the way throughout the movie. It was distracting and Lucas Black takes his character far too seriously. I also couldn’t grasp why he was immediately taken into the street racing scene in Tokyo. Here he is: a fish out of the water. He hooks up with Twink in the ugliest car you’ve probably ever seen, even uglier than the Fiat Multipla. Without any built up cred he is handed a car they dubbed “The Mona Lisa” which he then wrecks apart completely due to his inability to drift. After that the guy owning the Mona Lisa says he’s in debt, but befriends him and lends/gives him another car for him to train in. Who in their right mind would do that?
This is the first Fast and Furious that actually deals only with street racing; no heists or undercover jobs. Even the Yakuza subplot is simply dealt with through a race. Actually, this installment in the franchise is basically The Karate Kid of the series, though as one of the characters points out: there is no wax on, wax off.
The Fast and the Furious: Tokyo Drift has a basic plot, which is probably more than enough for the target audience who just wants to see all those tuned cars accompanied by slow motion shots over the engines and hot chicks in skimpy clothing. The movie provides all that and as a bonus a lot of homosexual undertones…
Sean constantly gets into trouble. He seems to be an angry young man, probably because of his closeted homosexuality. While he constantly chases after Neela, they still haven’t kissed when the end credits are rolling. When he’s not trying to convince himself of his heterosexuality he’s with other men, one of them a twink, and constantly giving other guys certain looks. In the opening scene he has a confrontation with a school jock, and they just stare to each other while Sean holds a wrench in his hand as if it was a cock. Then the other guy rolls with his tongue… If they were alone, they would probably start to make out. Later on when Sean is driving in Twink’s car he stares at some hot girls and Twink hands him a box of tissues he apparently keeps in his car. Then they smile to each other… I was like: What did I just watch? What was the meaning? Does Twink want him to masturbate in front of him or something, or together with him, or what?
Here bro, I don’t want your stains on my clothes…
The one way a Fast and Furious movie could really surprise me was with a twist ending. With all these subtle hints; the looks, the stares, the bromances, the fact that none of the guys from Sean’s crew ever seem to hook up with a girl despite hot chicks being everywhere, it would be an epic twist if at the end of the movie, after a won race, or successful heist the two male leads would walk up to each other and french kiss.
For a series of action movies with lots of hot women, these women seem to be missing out on all the action.
This movie will probably please the young male crowd who love all these tuned cars, but for everyone else The Fast and the Furious: Tokyo Drift has little to give that hasn’t been done better in dozens of other movies. The plot is so cliche I could not only predict the outcome an hour in advance, I could also predict the dialogue before it was said. It’s such a basic, rehashed script with some cars added to it.
Everybody knows that one guy that’s in his 30s or even 40s but who still gets excited about something as juvenile as fireworks. This is a movie he would probably love.
