Filmed in Thailand and set somewhere in Southeast Asia, “The Furious” (2025) follows a father, a Chinese mute handyman (Miao Xie), looking for his kidnapped daughter, Rainy (Enyou Yang), while a journalist, Navin (Joe Taslim), looks for his fellow journalist and wife, Matia (JeeJa Yanin), who was investigating whether the increase of missing children was an unfortunate, unrelated coincidence. When the two men decide to team up, they uncover a criminal organization that engages in an underground child trafficking market with a fight club and other legitimate businesses providing cover for their illegal operation. Is “The Furious” the best action movie of the year? Director Kenji Tanigaki teaches a masterclass in how to shoot action, and no one should be allowed to make an action film until they watch this movie.
Xie is not mute in real life, but the average movie goer would not know that after watching “The Furious.” He plays a dad who prefers wearing flip flops to work, minds his business and is trying to get his daughter to practice kung fu so she can protect herself. Unfortunately, she did not take his advice and gets treated like a sack of potatoes when she gets kidnapped. Even if she had practiced, even her dad finds it hard to fight these guys. Ho (Brian Le) is like a mack truck in human form without the brain power to match and is under the misguided belief that Mr. Song (Sahajak Boonthaanakit), the man who probably snatched him as child, is his father. Donkey Head (Winai Wiangyangkung) has an Afro and similarly has a “son” who helps lure Rainy to them. Of course there are scores more henchmen, but they do not need any introduction other than the panic in their eyes when dad decides he is going to whoop all their asses.
The trailer shows dear old dad unable to keep up with the truck. Nope. For once, the trailer does not show the best parts of the movie hence leaving nothing new to the ticket holders. You cannot anticipate half the wild sequences that you are going to see. A lot of action movies make the mistake of not pacing the fights well so they feel monotonous or the best fights come too early then the denouement feels anti-climactic. Not here, but then you will find yourself wondering how in the world will they top the fight that you are watching then they do. Best of all, “The Furious” does not engage in any of that chaos cinema crap. You’re going to see all the choreography and believe that it is all practical, not special effects or CGI. There is not even a lot of obvious, unrealistic wire work. The camera catches the entire fight, and one of Xie’s specialties is fighting then ascending his human moving opponents like rocks on a mountain. It is gorgeous to see. A lot of blunt objects get thrown around and make contact, so the most unrealistic part of the movie is that people take a long time to die, but die they do. Even the kid gets in on the stunts. Forget daddy daughter dances. Daddy daughter fights are where it is at. Also, now introducing Chekhov’s steel toe boots. You will thank me later.
So it is not surprising that dad and Navin meet in the middle of a fight. In “The Furious” universe, everyone, even the journalists, have hands. Navin was doing a good job getting the villains to believe that he was a degenerate mover and shaker like them, but the handyman’s timing blew up that spot. Taslim is terrific at seeming like the reasonable one in the duo before doing the most unhinged things. He may be more vengeful than his de facto partner, particularly when it is time to fight the archer Tak (Yayan Ruhian). American audiences will recognize Ruhian from “Boy Kills World” (2023), but he has been a martial arts legend since “The Raid” franchise, which I still need to see. He has a slighter build than most of the cast, but do not judge a book by its cover. His character convincingly takes out scores of people as if he was doing light dusting on a Saturday morning.
Of course, there are some normal people in “The Furious.” When the handyman reports the crime to the cops, Sergeant Yadong (Manatsanun Phanlerdwongsakul) begins to wonder if the Captain is complicit. The rest of the men are just glorified bureaucrats, but Yadong is innately professional and shocked at how everyone is ignoring the corruption. There are also the rich people who profit from this criminal enterprise, and they are mostly so far removed from the action that they do not seem as if they ever get their hands dirty. The heir to the organization, Paklung (Joey Iwanaga), finds it challenging to balance and separate family and work life. His father-in-law is his boss and is disgusted at how things are going south. His pregnant wife seems oblivious to her family’s illicit business. Well, plot twist. Turns out that Paklung is a deranged killer who has just been putting up a civilized, pretty, rich boy front, and he is ready to get his hands dirty.
If you think that “The Furious” is a bit basic in terms of storytelling, think elemental and streamlined. A story is not only told through dialogue, but Kensuke Sonomura’s fight choreography. Every character has a distinct, recognizable style even when things are happening really quickly. The actual story drags a little when the two men initially catch each other up about their respective investigation progress, but the fights tell a distinct story. There was only one confusing moment that feels as if some connective tissue was missing, but it is an acceptable error rate. Watch the movie two times, and you will get so much more after the second viewing that you may not have noticed the first time around, and it will clear up any questions that you may have. There are nice subtle touches throughout that are easy to miss when you are just trying to figure out what is going on and how far everything will go. Pretty far. Kids get killed and tortured. People die gruesome deaths, and they are not bloodless.
Composers Flying Lotus, Elliot Leung and Olivia Xiaolin create different styles of scores for different scenes, and the music never takes center stage or is too obtrusive. In the club scene, there is techno, but it is not overpowering electronic dance music. There are traditional Asian musical notes sprinkled throughout. There are also heavy metal guitar riffs. During the denouement, the editor Chris Tonick splits the screen into five separate images to show the mental calculation that one character is undergoing while figuring out who to attack almost like a Western at high noon.
“The Furious” is the kind of movie that is guaranteed to become a cult classic. It is the kind of movie that I would want playing continuously in a loop in the background at home if it did not give the wrong impression. Sure, it is not perfect. The filmmakers compromised and sided with making the movie more marketable when they decided to use so much English dialogue. It sounds dubbed and is obtrusive, but it will probably add to the cult charm of the movie.
