Diesel plays Xander Cage, a bald, buff, tattooed rebel with a cause. An extreme sports junkie and lover of hot cars ("I like anything fast enough to do something stupid in"), he pulls death-defying stunts to frustrate the establishment—all recorded for an underground Web site. We meet him as he’s stealing and wrecking the car of a senator opposed to point-and-shoot video games and rap music. Then the feds close in. Needing an expendable operative with street smarts, the National Security Agency shanghais him, promising to wipe his slate clean if he cooperates.

Xander winds up in Czechoslovakia playing spy games in order to keep anarchists from unleashing a biological weapon on the world’s major cities. He’s a quick study. Duties range from gathering data to having sex with strange women and amassing a sizable body count. He’s just another in a long line of amoral agents loaded down with guns and gadgets, assigned to fuel male fantasies.