Jimmy Cullen has been in prison for ten years, and he is not coming out slowly. He wants blood, and he wants it fast. Faster, the 2010 crime thriller starring Dwayne Johnson, is a revenge picture built around a man who will stop at nothing to avenge his brother’s death. It is a film about a man who moves through Los Angeles with a gun, a list, and a burning need for justice that refuses to wait for the courts.
The film follows Driver, a small-time criminal played by Johnson, as he hunts down everyone connected to his brother’s murder. He kills a man named Prescott Ashton at a telemarketing office in Bakersfield, California. He forces Roy Grone, who gave him the car and gun, to hand over more names. He finds Kenneth Tyson, a man who makes snuff films, and kills him. He stabs a bouncer named Hovis Nixon at a strip club in Nevada. He even walks into a hospital and kills Nixon while he is in surgery.
The setup is simple. The execution is relentless.
Trailer, via DUB Magazine.
Driver’s List
Driver’s method is a matter of efficiency. He takes a name, he finds the person, he kills them. There is no room for hesitation, no room for mercy, and no room for the law. That is the appeal of the film’s premise: a man who decides his own fate, who cuts through red tape and bureaucracy by simply doing what needs to be done.
Dwayne Johnson plays Driver with a physicality that matches the material. He is a large man, built for violence, and he moves through the film with a grim determination that carries the audience along. His performance is solid, though the script rarely asks him to do much beyond showing up and being angry. The role is a vehicle, and Johnson drives it well enough to keep the engine running.
Billy Bob Thornton plays Detective Slade Humphries, the cop chasing Driver. He is a grizzled veteran who understands the rules, and he spends the film trying to catch a man who refuses to play by them. Carla Gugino plays Detective Cicero, his partner, and Oliver Jackson-Cohen plays Killer, the hitman hired to stop Driver. Maggie Grace plays Killer’s girlfriend, Lily, who becomes his wife later in the story.
The supporting cast fills out the world of the film, giving the revenge plot a sense of scale. Tom Berenger plays the warden, and Matt Gerald plays Driver’s late older half-brother, Gary. The film draws on a cast that includes Moon Bloodgood, Adewale Akinnuoye-Agbaje, Xander Berkeley, Courtney Gains, and Michael Irby, among others. Each of them gets a moment, but few get a chance to breathe.
The Revenge Formula
Faster is a revenge film in the classic mold. The protagonist has been wronged, and he sets out to destroy everything connected to that wrong. The formula is simple: find the list, check the names, and eliminate each one. The film does not complicate this with moral ambiguity or psychological depth. It trusts the audience to follow the trail of bodies and understand why Driver is doing what he is doing.
There is a certain grim pleasure in watching a man systematically dismantle the lives of those who wronged him. The film does not pretend this is noble. It presents it as the natural consequence of a broken system. Slow justice is no justice, the tagline promises, and the film delivers on that promise by making Driver a force of nature that cannot be stopped.
The film is at its best when it is moving. The action sequences are quick, the editing is sharp, and the pacing keeps the momentum building. When the film slows down, however, it loses some of its tension. The middle stretch, where Driver tracks Tyson and the hitman Killer closes in, drags slightly. The film’s strength is its forward motion, and when it stops to explain itself, it loses some of its energy.
The Chase
The centerpiece of the film is the chase between Driver and Killer. It is a tense sequence, with the two men circling each other in a gunfight that spills into a hospital corridor. Killer is affected by the encounter, and the film suggests that the task has become personal. After proposing marriage to his girlfriend, Lily, he begins to take the job seriously. The sequence builds to a climax that feels earned, even if the film’s logic occasionally stretches to justify it.
Billy Bob Thornton and Oliver Jackson-Cohen play off each other well. Thornton brings a weary intelligence to his role, while Jackson-Cohen plays Killer with a cold precision that makes him feel dangerous. Their scenes together are the film’s best, and they carry a weight that the rest of the script struggles to match.
The film’s weakness is its reliance on coincidence. People happen to be in the same place at the same time. Information comes to light at convenient moments. These are the kinds of shortcuts that can work in a thriller, but they also leave the film feeling less like a carefully constructed machine and more like a series of set pieces strung together.
The Hospital Scene
The film’s final act centers on the hospital, where Driver enters to kill Nixon while he is in surgery. Detective Slade Humphries tries to bring down Driver, but fails. The scene is tense, and it shows Driver’s ruthlessness. He sees the badge and hesitates, sparing the detective, but the moment is more symbolic than dramatic. It is a brief pause in a film that otherwise refuses to slow down.
The hospital sequence is the film’s most ambitious, and it is also its most demanding. It requires the audience to keep track of multiple threads at once: Driver’s hunt, the detectives’ pursuit, and the hitman’s growing obsession. The film handles it reasonably well, but it is a stretch for a movie with a runtime of just over an hour and a half.
The Cast
The cast is capable, but the script does not give them much to work with. Billy Bob Thornton and Carla Gugino are solid as the detectives, and Maggie Grace adds a layer of warmth to her role as Killer’s girlfriend. Oliver Jackson-Cohen is effective as the hitman, though his philosophical transformation feels rushed. Dwayne Johnson carries the film, but he is playing within narrow confines.
The film also features a number of actors in smaller roles, including Moon Bloodgood, Adewale Akinnuoye-Agbaje, Xander Berkeley, Courtney Gains, and Michael Irby. Each of them gets a moment, but none of them gets a full arc. The film is too busy to slow down and let anyone breathe.
The Production
The film was directed by George Tillman Jr., working from a script by Tony and Joe Gayton. It was released on November 24, 2010, by CBS Films in the United States, and by Sony Pictures Releasing International in international markets. The film grossed $35.6 million against a production budget of $24 million.
The film’s production values are adequate. The action is staged with competence, and the locations are shot with a sense of place. The film does not look expensive, but it does not look cheap either. It is a professional product, working within its means.
The Verdict
Faster is a solid, if unspectacular, entry in the revenge thriller genre. It is not a masterpiece, but it is not a failure either. It is a film that knows what it wants to be and executes it with reasonable skill. The problem is that the idea is better than the execution. The premise is strong, but the script does not do enough with it.
The film is at its best when it is moving, and at its worst when it is explaining. The chase sequences are tense, the hospital scenes are ambitious, and the performances are competent. But the middle stretch drags, the coincidences strain credibility, and the ending feels rushed. It is a film that is easy to watch but hard to recommend.
Here is how the elements stack up:
- The premise: Strong. A man with a list and a gun is a compelling idea.
- The pacing: Mixed. Fast when it needs to be, slow when it shouldn’t be.
- The action: Competent. The fights are well-staged, but not memorable.
- The cast: Solid. Dwayne Johnson leads a capable ensemble.
- The direction: Adequate. George Tillman Jr. keeps things moving.
- The writing: Weak. The script relies on coincidence and rushes character development.
Faster is a film that is easy to summarize because it does not ask much of the audience. It is a revenge thriller that delivers what it promises, but it does not promise much beyond that. It is a film that is best enjoyed as a guilty pleasure, not a work of art.
The film’s score reflects this. It is a middling effort, neither brilliant nor forgettable. It is a film that is worth seeing once, but not worth revisiting.
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