The Furious Delivers Bone-Breaking Martial Arts Mayhem

The Furious

★ ★ ★

The Furious is a simple story told through an insanely entertaining extravaganza of martial arts, blood and broken bones. It’s a juggernaut of action, and once it gets going, it only speeds up on a violent collision course toward an epic fight-scene finale. It’s so well choreographed that it delivers some of the best kung fu fights in recent cinematic history.

By the end of the film, I realized how out of shape I am, found myself a bit out of breath just watching the action and was reminded of how woefully overdue I am to hit the gym.

Miao Xie as Wang Wei and Brian Le as Ho
© 2026 Lionsgate

Wang Wei (Miao Xie) is a single father to his daughter, Rainy (Enyou Yang). She normally lives with her grandmother and is visiting him for the summer. He has been teaching her kung fu, because he wants her to be able to defend herself, even insisting she get a shorter haircut that favors a functional fighting style over beauty. She’s just entering her teen years, and you can imagine this doesn’t go over well.

Rainy storms out of the hair salon and is quickly abducted by child traffickers into the back of a truck. Wang chases after the truck, catches up to it and fights valiantly to save Rainy. Despite his impressive efforts, he can’t save her, and now he must track down the traffickers.

Miao Xie as Wang Wei and Enyou Yang as Rainy
© 2026 Lionsgate

Meanwhile, Navin (Joe Taslim), the husband of a missing journalist named Matia (JeeJa Yanin), has been investigating the same trafficking ring, desperately hoping to find her alive. Their paths cross at a mixed martial arts fighting club that seems to serve up prostitution along with bloody cage match fighting. Wang and Navin don’t know they’re supposed to be friends yet, and they fight each other in the club until they figure out they’re on the same side.

When they team up, they’re unstoppable, even when faced with some incredibly formidable foes. It’s both exhilarating and exhausting watching them fight.

Miao Xie as Wang Wei
© 2026 Lionsgate

The simple plot really serves as a backdrop to the action, though it does feed the motivations of the characters well, giving them depth and a mission we can empathize with as we root for them to break as many bad-guy bones as humanly possible.

1987’s Lethal Weapon boasts a final scene with three martial arts styles that took four nights to film, and back in the day, looked pretty impressive. Both Lethal Weapon and The Furious took roughly three months to film. With all the fight choreography displayed in this near-nonstop martial arts beatdown, it’s clear we’ve come a long way from Jean-Claude Van Damme’s jumping split kick and Steven Seagal’s two or three signature aikido moves on repeat. Thankfully.

All this being said, I find films that use human trafficking, especially involving kids, as the backdrop to the story a bit distasteful. There’s a scene near the opening of the film in which Matia is trying to free a child from the concrete basement dungeon of one of the trafficking rings. I won’t describe the scene, as what was about to happen is gut-wrenching. It’s shown briefly, and before we’re given time to process what she saved him from, we’re thrust into a well-choreographed action scene.

Miao Xie as Want Wei and Joe Taslim as Navin
© 2026 Lionsgate

To present such a dark topic and jump straight to fighting feels disingenuous to me. It’s a pet peeve of mine, and I wish they had chosen something else to motivate the characters. I understand we need something powerful for the plot, and a film like this could have chosen other circumstances. Maybe I just need to lighten up, but it’s the one thing that kept me from embracing the film completely.

Still, the skill demonstrated on screen, both in front of the camera and behind it, is a marvel to witness. It’s an adrenaline-pumping action thrill ride that even casual fans of martial arts films will notice. As I walked out of the film, I had to look up and see if Planet Fitness still offers an affordable plan. They do, at $15 a month, $5 more than I paid a few years ago. Oh well. There’s always next month.