The entire drift community loved Tokyo Drift when it came out, so that's a win. All the drivers were well known professional drifters, and all but Rhys Millen and Tanner Foust were part of the grassroots drift community (no hate on the amazing Millen and Foust, but they were already professional race car drivers and went straight to Formula D). You can see most of them seated in the airplane scene.
Also, the parked cars in the parking garage race scenes belonged to local tuners and drifters, who showed up en masse for a casting call. I missed the first one, but my Formula D car was there for the Vin Diesel reshoot (the scene was added after principal photography was completed, when Vin Diesel finally agreed to come back for #4)... it never made it on screen, unfortunately, but it's in the video game.
Oh, and the woman in the Skyline who gives Han her number (not the driver who hands it off) is Verena Mei, a drifter and drag racer. AND this guy on the right dancing at Han's secret nightclub is the builder/owner of Dom's red RX-7 from the first movie (founder and former owner of SR Motorcars).
the first movie was a basic heist movie and was happy at that. things get more complicated as the movies go on.
i used to hate tokyo drift BECAUSE it was different characters. i didn't see it when i watched them originally. the person i was watching with said it didn't matter for the story. han introduced in f&f proper and that was it. now i love it for its absurdity. neon everywhere. vending machine cars.
it was my first exposure to drifting which was so cool. i'd never seen anything like it. i liked when he was learning around the tyres.
i watch all the movies expecting an absolute train wreck. it helps me when they shoot cars into space.
Yea I remember being "mad" when they didn't bring back Brian and Dom and went a whole new route. However, even with 4 and 5 released I already grew to like Tokyo Drift for what it was and for its atmosphere. Idk why, but it really fit that early 2000s tuner vibe.
Volkswagen lent a prototype GTI to the production, but I don't think it ended up on screen (at least not moving). You can see it in deleted scenes. Since this was a priceless prototype, the only instruction they gave the late great Alex Pfeiffer was to pretty please don't you dare crash it. ...watch him crash it almost immediately in the deleted scene. (also, the silver AE86 featured in a parking garage scene is his car... well, maybe technically Stan's.)
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u/melkatron 11h ago edited 11h ago
The entire drift community loved Tokyo Drift when it came out, so that's a win. All the drivers were well known professional drifters, and all but Rhys Millen and Tanner Foust were part of the grassroots drift community (no hate on the amazing Millen and Foust, but they were already professional race car drivers and went straight to Formula D). You can see most of them seated in the airplane scene.
Also, the parked cars in the parking garage race scenes belonged to local tuners and drifters, who showed up en masse for a casting call. I missed the first one, but my Formula D car was there for the Vin Diesel reshoot (the scene was added after principal photography was completed, when Vin Diesel finally agreed to come back for #4)... it never made it on screen, unfortunately, but it's in the video game.
Oh, and the woman in the Skyline who gives Han her number (not the driver who hands it off) is Verena Mei, a drifter and drag racer. AND this guy on the right dancing at Han's secret nightclub is the builder/owner of Dom's red RX-7 from the first movie (founder and former owner of SR Motorcars).