Vin Diese

News, Reviews & Features
  • Review: Fast & Furious 9 is a bloodless blockbuster Scalextric

    Movie Review | Ali Gray | 27th June 2021

    Is there any point in bothering to review a film like Fast & Furious 9? Its very existence is a middle finger to anyone who genuinely considers themselves to be a 'film critic' - even its title feels like the sort of cute background gag you'd see in Back To The Future II, a sly crack at Hollywood's over-reliance on familiar formula. Let me rephrase my original question: is there any point in me bothering to review a film like Fast & Furious 9? The answer is yes, thank you very much, because I haven't reviewed a film since 2019 and I couldn't imagine booking an easier comeback gig. It's a big stupid target for someone like me to take cheap potshots at and at the same time feel good about myself for ultimately giving it a positive review, as per the will of the people. Everybody wins! Except the criminals.

  • Marvel's Cine-CHAT-ic Universe: Guardians Of The Galaxy (2014)

    Movie Feature | Ali Gray, Matt Looker, Becky Suter, Ed Williamson, Luke Whiston | 28th March 2019

    It's the regular feature you assumed had been quietly abandoned - but we've got nothing else going on right now! We're back with another scintillating edition of Marvel's Cine-CHATIC Universe: this week/month/quarter, we're talking about James Gunn's Guardians Of The Galaxy, but also, very much other things too.

  • Analysing the cast signatures on that Guardians Of The Galaxy support letter

    Movie Feature | Ali Gray | 31st July 2018

    Touching scenes online this week, as the cast members of Marvel's Guardians Of The Galaxy series banded together in a show of support for fired director James Gunn, by co-signing a letter that almost but not quite called for his reinstatement. Gunn, a former Troma filmmaker and purveyor of questionable humour, was fired by Disney after a bunch of right-wing lunatics, led by lisping dong Mike Cernovich, dredged up a bunch of offensive ten year-old tweets and weaponised their fake outrage in order to punish the director for his outspoken liberal views. It’s all very 2018, but let’s focus on the real issue here: MOVIE STAR SIGNATURES!

  • Fast And Furious cast still unable to tell women from cars

    Movie Feature | Matt Looker | 29th June 2017

    Fresh concerns have arisen regarding the ability of the Fast And Furious cast to tell the difference between women and cars after franchise regular Michelle Rodriguez called out the need for "female characters with better parts".

  • Fast & Furious 8

    Movie Review | Ali Gray | 11th April 2017

    The Fast & Furious franchise is not big on learning. It doesn't really care for consequences. It is of the moment. Always in the now. If it were a person, it would be the kind of person who sincerely believes in the motto 'If you can't handle me at my worst, you don't deserve me at my best'. Fast & Furious movies are wrongheaded and backwards but they don't care, because people vote with their wallets. They are Brexit. They are dumb. They make dumb look dumb. They are awful. They are brilliant. They are confusing and simple and ridiculous and serious all at the same time, somehow. Fast & Furious 8, a title and a number which give me great pleasure to say together, is all of these things and more.

  • xXx: Return Of Xander Cage

    Movie Review | Ali Gray | 19th January 2017

    One of my New Year's Resolutions for 2017 was to watch more movies I wouldn't normally watch, with the intent of broadening my cinematic horizons. Little did I know, the first invite to plop into my inbox would be for xXx: Return Of Xander Cage, an action movie so extreme that it doesn't even have the time to include the definitive article in its title. I have never walked out of a movie, but the closest I've ever come is during the first xXx in 2002, around about the time Vin Diesel's buff Generation X-er snowboarded down an avalanche on a tea tray. I assumed that in his absence, Cage had been hitting the books, ready to return older, wiser and woke. But then the movie opened with xXx jumping off a TV transmitter and skiing through a jungle, so I guess I'll be putting off the broadening of my cinematic horizons until another day.

  • Shock: Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 2 made by same people as Vol. 1

    Movie Feature | Ali Gray | 17th February 2016

    Is all this really necessary? Next you'll be telling me Star Wars: Episode VIII features some of the characters from Star Wars: Episode VII. Some but not all. Too soon? Too soon.

  • Ranking the Fast & Furious films in the order in which they were made

    Movie Feature | Ali Gray | 30th March 2015

    Fast & Furious 7 [car verb]s its way into cinemas this week, meaning movie sites are rolling out their bi-annual Fast & Furious feature ideas. Rather than a highly subjective ranking of all seven Fast & Furious movies in order of their perceived quality, which is entirely dependant on the individual taste of the author, we thought we'd try something a little less arbitrary. So, we present to you, our ranking of the seven Fast & Furious movies based on the order in which they were released. There's precisely zero room for debate. Strap yourselves in!

  • Fast & Furious 7

    Movie Review | Ali Gray | 23rd March 2015

    For the first time since its inception in 2001, the Fast & Furious franchise was forced to hit the brakes. The unfortunate – but avoidable – death of Paul Walker in an automobile accident in November 2013 meant production on Part 7 skidded to a halt. Now, one year on from its planned release, Furious 7 rides into town after a respectful re-pimping – the muted colours on the poster suggests a star-studded funeral procession, but in actual fact, the latest instalment of The Franchise That Couldn't Slow Down is business as usual: cars, explosions, pecs (men), gussets (women), crap jokes and the most flagrant disrespect for physics since Sir Isaac Newton's naysayers suggested he stick his apple up his arse. You wouldn't call it a fitting tribute to Walker – I'm pretty sure the last thing his family needs to see is 250 cars exploding into fireballs – but you suspect it's what he, the fans and the studio would have wanted. So here we are. Amber turned to green. Let's go.

  • Guardians Of The Galaxy

    Movie Review | Ali Gray | 29th July 2014

    Just for a second there it looked like Marvel might have let their foothold slip. Edgar Wright's departure had irreparably sullied Ant-Man; Captain America 3's release date clash with DC's Batman V Superman in 2016 seemed like a suicide mission; the suspicion lingered that Thor: The Dark World wasn't actually all that great in retrospect. Momentary blips, all, because Guardians Of The Galaxy is the most confident, daring and balls-out fun Marvel movie of the lot. The last two Marvel releases have been samey sequels, adhering largely to a tried and tested formula, but Guardians Of The Galaxy is one of Marvel's best films simply because it doesn't really feel like it's part of the Marvel universe at all.