The Fate of the Furious comes out this weekend in case you were somehow unaware or have forgotten about the return of the world’s biggest action movie franchise for its eighth installment of who knows how many.
The franchise has taken off in a way that no one could have ever imagined when it began in 2001, and over 16 years and seven more films they have added some significant names to the cast. Dwayne “The Rock” Johnson , who debuted in Fast Five, and Jason Statham, who debuted in Furious 7 (really the post-credits scene of Fast & Furious 6 to get technical), are the biggest additions to the franchise as two of Hollywood’s most well-known action stars.
When Statham was introduced as the bad guy for Furious 7 and we got closer to the film, trailers revealed we would get what we all wanted, which was a 1-on-1, Statham-Rock showdown. It was a great scene and gave us everything we could ask for: broken tables, shattered glass everywhere, a Rock Bottom and The Rock getting blown out of a window by a grenade. It had it all.
Statham and The Rock are back for the eighth film and based on the trailers, we’ll get another fight scene involving the two as they break out of prison — although, this time it’s more of them vs. prisoners. On an appearance with the Jim Norton and Sam Roberts Show, Statham was asked about going one-on-one with The Great One and explained why The Rock is a “10 out of 10” to work with in a fight scene.
“He’s so cool to do an action sequence with because he’s such a physical expert in what he does,” Statham said. “He moves fluidly. He’s got great judgement of time and space, so he’s not going to whack you in the face by accident — which is a godsend. People make mistakes. If you don’t have a good concept of sort of your own balance and space and 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, you’re straight down to the hospital [laughs].
“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.”
It’s high praise from Statham (and similar to what he told us back in 2015 when asked about that scene). We shouldn’t be surprised that Johnson is so good at those choreographed fight scenes considering his background as a WWE superstar, where you have to be so precise with your movements and know where you are and have the spatial awareness when swinging at someone or performing a move, or else you will seriously injure someone.
Statham also had some interesting thoughts lamenting about how Hollywood has a tendency to cut up fight scenes too much rather than leave a camera on the main fighter and let the audience really feel like they’re involved in the fight — something John Wick: Chapter 2‘s director and stunt coordinator’s told us about wanting to do.
As for The Rock being upset with someone (reportedly Vin Diesel) during filming, Statham said he purposefully avoided digging into that so he could honestly answer that question by saying he had no clue about any possible Rock-Diesel beef.
