AI could never do what The Furious does. Although the whirling limbs and feats of strength are thrilling in themselves, what really makes Kenji Tanigaki’s pan-Asian action spectacle so awe-inspiring is the fact that everything you see is being done by human beings. Yes, humans can run that fast. We can jump that high and punch that hard and keep fighting at a ferocious pace for 15 minutes straight without collapsing from exhaustion. The performers that can do these things have dedicated their lives to the pursuit of their art, and the passion and dedication that it takes to sculpt a human body into a tough, yet agile martial-arts fighting machine are clearly visible in their work. An actual machine couldn’t replicate that if it tried.
Born in Japan, writer-director Tanigaki — also a respected stunt coordinator with dozens of credits — got his start as a member of Donnie Yen’s stunt team, which accounts both for his reverence for the art form and his international approach. Set in an unnamed country in Southeast Asia and performed largely in English, The Furious brings together martial-arts stars from China, Indonesia, and Thailand, as well as Japanese-American and Vietnamese-American fighters, combining each of their individual approaches into a veritable Olympics of ass kicking.
