20 facts you might not know about 'The Fast and the Furious'

Rob Cohen, who directed The Fast and the Furious, got the idea for the film off of a 1998 article in Vibe about illegal street racing in New York City. It focused on an unidentified racer called “Racer X.” Cohen would then go watch some illegal races in Los Angeles as well.

Given how the series has played out, it’s hard to imagine a world where The Fast and the Furious has a different title. However, once upon a time that was the case. The first was initially titled “Redline” before the change to the title we know and love.

Roger Corman was the king of low-budget independent filmmaking, and he helped bolster a lot of careers. He also had a knack for titles, apparently. In 1954, he produced a film called The Fast and the Furious, which he also wrote the story for. To be able to use the title for their own film, the studio had to license the rights to the title “The Fast and the Furious” from Corman.

Universal was ready to green light the film, but they had one condition: they wanted Timothy Olyphant to play Dominic Toretto. The producers were happy with that idea, but there was one snag. Olyphant had just been in Gone in 60 Seconds the year prior, and he didn’t want to be in a similar film, so he declined.

Neal Moritz, one of the producers of The Fast and the Furious, had seen Vin Diesel in some of his smaller, supporting roles and liked him as an actor. As such, Moritz suggested they hire Diesel to play Toretto. However, Diesel was skeptical about taking on the role, even though it would be his first lead role in a studio film. Eventually, the producers were able to talk him into it.

The movie had its Dom, but what about Brian, the undercover cop who infiltrates the street racing world? For that role, the studio wanted Eminem, who wasn’t an actor…yet. Even so, Eminem turned them down so that he could star in 8 Mile, the movie largely based on his own life.

Eminem was out of the picture, but the filmmakers still had some ideas. They considered Mark Wahlberg and Christian Bale, though both were likely too big to sign on for the movie, even by then. Moritz, though, had just worked with Paul Walker on The Skulls and sent him the script. Walker signed on to play Brian.

Clearly, few people were expecting much from The Fast and the Furious. That seems to include Eliza Dushku. Apparently, Mia Toretto was written with Dushku in mind, but she still turned down the role.

Dushku was out, but some actresses were apparently interested in playing Mia. In the mix were Sarah Michelle Gellar, Jessica Biel, and a pre-Spider-Man Kirsten Dunst. Ultimately, though, Jordana Brewster won the role.

David Ayer had his first screenplay credit in 2000 with U-571, and in 2001, he made waves with Training Day. He was also brought on to do a rewrite on The Fast and the Furious, which got him a credit on the film. Ayer really changed the film, as he apparently moved it from suburban New York to the heart of Los Angeles. He diversified the characters as well.

Jordana Brewster and Michelle Rodriguez had a bit of an issue facing when they were cast. Specifically, neither of them had a driver’s license. As such, they had to take driving lessons during production.

There are plenty of practical car stunts done in The Fast and the Furious. In fact, 78 cars were wrecked in making the movie. One of the stunts wasn’t real, though. When Brian and Dom are racing across the train track as a train bears down on them, the two cars driving across the track and the train were shot separately. Then, the two shots were composited into one.

The Fast and the Furious did a reverse Edward Scissorhands. In the latter film, houses were painted to look bright and garish. For The Fast and the Furious, houses were painted muted colors to help the cars pop more on screen.

In the script, Dom is 24, which makes sense given where he is in life. If you weren’t aware of that, you might not peg Toretto as being 24. That’s likely because, at the time of the film, Diesel was already 34 years old.

The film on television at Dom’s house is Dragon: The Bruce Lee Story. It’s pretty easy to figure out why that movie was chosen. That film is directed by Cohen, and it was arguably his breakout movie as a director.

A PG-13 rating is the sweet spot for most films looking to take in a lot of cash. By getting an R rating, you lose some of your potential audience. Originally, The Fast and the Furious was given an R rating, but they managed to get that knocked down to a PG-13 fairly easily. All they did was cut some footage of Vince’s injured arm during the final robbery. It was apparently a little gory for the film raters.

This is a film franchise known for a loose tether to reality when it comes to physics, but The Fast and the Furious is a little more sensible and down to earth. That is, save for the final quarter-mile race. Both cars are seen getting over 150 miles per hour, which is impossible for any current car in that short a distance. Plus, that race takes up over two minutes of screen time. In real life, that kind of race would be over in roughly 10 seconds.

The music of The Fast and the Furious isn’t necessarily famous, and yet, two soundtracks were released for the movie. One was all hip-hop songs, while the other was all alt-rock and nu metal music. Apparently, they felt like those two worlds shouldn’t meet on one soundtrack.

The Fast and the Furious didn’t have any big stars, or much in the way of critical acclaim. It was made for $38 million, which is not a big budget for a studio action movie. Then, the movie debuted No. 1 in the box office by making $40 million domestically. All in all, it made $207.3 million worldwide.

The surprise success of The Fast and the Furious gave us a sequel in 2 Fast 2 Furious, a title we will always remember. When it didn’t hit as well as they had hoped, they made a cheap-y film with none of the original stars in Tokyo Drift. Then, they decided to go back to the original gang, and it quickly became the biggest action franchise in the world. There have been nine Fast films, a 10th and 11th are coming, and don’t forget the Hobbs and Shaw spinoff as well.