Of all the movies set to hit theaters in 2017, few have managed to match the sheer buzz generated by The Fate of the Furious. The eighth installment in the Fast & Furious franchise has a lot to live up to after the last film performed so well, and much of that responsibility will fall on the shoulders of Dwayne Johnson as Hobbs and Jason Statham as Deckard Shaw. Luckily for F. Gary Gray's new film (and fortunately for us) Statham clearly enjoys the process, and has nothing but good things to say about shooting a vicious melee with The Rock. Statham explained why it was such a comfortable working experience,
He's so cool to do an action sequence with because he's such a physical sort of expert in what he does. He moves fluidly. He's got great sort of judgment of time and space, so he's not going to whack you in the head by mistake, which is a godsend... People make mistakes. If you haven't got a sort of good concept of your own sort of balance and space. If you're swinging hard with adrenaline, you're trying to miss each other, but carefully miss each other. And if you're not accurate in that sense, you can really make a mistake and if he makes a mistake and you're on the receiving end of it, then it's straight down to the hospital. So, he's the opposite of that. He's extremely precise and he's just so relaxed. He's just a diamond to work with. He's a 10 out of 10.
Not all action stars are built the same, but Jason Statham's recent comments on Jim and Sam Show seem to indicate that Dwayne Johnson is one of the better co-stars that he has worked with over the years. As a trained martial artist, Statham appears to have developed an appreciation for his fellow action movie icons who know how to control their bodies and deliver fake blows with realistic precision. Given The Rock's history as a football player, a professional wrestler, and a bodybuilder, he has the requisite body control to go toe-to-toe with Statham -- without sending him to the hospital.
Considering how intense their first fight was during the events of Furious 7, it's probably a good thing that Dwayne Johnson knows how to handle himself.
The real question is how antagonistic Deckard Shaw and Hobbs will be with one another in The Fate of the Furious. These two characters very clearly don't like each other (and the trailers show them at each other's throats on a few occasions), but they will also have to team up to bring Dom Toretto (Vin Diesel) back into the fold. Will they find common ground by the end of the new Fast & Furious film? Or will they tear each other apart? Only time will tell.
Jason Statham and Dwayne Johnson will return for their highly anticipated rematch when The Fate of the Furious opens in theaters on April 14.
