The Furious is the product of former fight choreographer Kenji Tanigaki, who is the man who gave 2024's Twilight of the Warriors:Walled In such crunchy martial arts action, among other recent Hong Kong classics. This is his 3rd film as a director and it is a corker.
The plot, involving child kidnapping and human trafficking, is a wafer-thin excuse for a team-up between investigative journalist Navin (Joe Taslim) and mute handyman Wang Wei (Xie Miao) who are seeking out the criminals who kidnapped Wei's daughter and murdered Navin's wife.
The actual conspiracy proves multi-layered, with the initial gang being fairly swiftly dealt with, only to uncover a bigger threat from corrupt cops and the politically-connected white-collar gangster Paklung, who proves a much more formidable opponent than his crisp suits might imply, particularly thanks to his bow-wielding muscle, Tak, played by the incredible Yayan Ruhian, who was so memorable in The Raid that they brought him back to play an even worse character in The Raid 2.
Honestly though, this film is all about the action. Happy to report then that this is chin-musical symphony of great sophistication and inventiveness.
Both Taslim and Miao have distinct fighting styles but both lean into grappling and judo rather than striking (although there is a fair bit of that, of course) which gives a lot of the action a more strategic and thoughtful feel than you may be used to. Ruchian is his usual frenetic murder-demon self and former stuntman Brian Le has a memorable turn as Ho - a henchman who gives every impression of being a literal human tank and who is instrumental in two of the film's best sequences.
If the film has a flaw, it is that the pacing is a little erratic and some of the peripheral performances can be a bit route one. Nevertheless, this is a significant addition to the action canon and a whole lot of fun.