Road to Destruction

It's the beginning of the end in Fast X, the penultimate film in the nitro-powered saga which unleashes Jason Momoa's sadistic new villain on Dom and the family and brings Brie Larson's guardian angel' into the fold. Total Film revs up with director Louis Leterrier, producer/star Vin Diesel and the new Fast cast to reveal the explosive story behind the series' latest chaos-fuelled entry...

- By Jordan Farley

It was 11pm on Thursday 28 April 2022 when director Louis Leterrier received the phone call that turbo-charged the next year of his life. Forty-eight hours prior, veteran Fast & Furious franchise filmmaker Justin Lin had abruptly resigned as the director of Fast X, days into production on the full-throttle family saga’s 10th mainline instalment. A replacement director was needed and, naturally, they were needed fast.

‘I got a phone call from [president of Universal Pictures] Peter Cramer on his cell phone – I really thought it was a butt dial!’ Leterrier tells TF over Zoom in early March. After all, late-night calls from the personal mobile phones of major studio heads are not the norm, even in Hollywood. ‘I learned then and there what was happening. He said, “Can you read a script by 5am, so we can have a meeting?”’

Leterrier had flirted with Fast in the past; he was in the conversation to direct Tokyo Drift, Fast & Furious 8 and Hobbs & Shaw. After staying up all night to read, and reread, the script for Fast X, he was asked a simple question: would you be interested? ‘I said no,’ Leterrier recalls. ‘I couldn’t fathom doing this. It’s just impossible. It’s just massive. Doing any movie, any TV show, anything without prep is crazy, let alone doing the biggest movie in the biggest action franchise of all time.’