Fast and Furious franchise once paid a fake director to 'go to jail for them' for bizarre reason

The filmmakers behind the Fast and Furious franchise paid a fake director to go to jail for a very unusual reason.

Breaking the law is a given for the characters featured in the Universal movie series, but it has since transpired there was some questionably legal activity going on behind the cameras, too.

Tokyo Drift, the third movie of the Fast and Furious saga released in 2006, was directed by Justin Lin, who went on to direct the next five films of the franchise.

Yet the Taiwanese-American director discovered gaining permission to film in certain parts of Japan is notoriously difficult, with both cast and crew tied up with legal permits.

The movie was partly filmed in Tokyo (Universal Pictures)

But Universal had a back-up plan - and it worked.

It's a job description that is bound to raise a few eyebrows, but bosses managed to hire someone to pretend to be the movie's director in case the team landed in hot water with the Japanese authorities.

Lin wanted to film in Tokyo to make the movie as authentic as possible, particularly as many other filmmakers had failed to do so, forcing them to rely on movie sets in other locations to replicate the dazzling city.

The director had his heart set on Shibuya, a crowded spot in the city where he wanted to film a drift race through the cross-section.

Yet, unable to get a permit the legal way, Lin took a risk to press ahead with filming anyway - when Tokyo cops descended on the scene in real life.

The famous Shibuya pedestrian crossing in Tokyo (Getty Images)

Speaking to Digital Spy at the time, Lin said: "When we went to shoot in Tokyo it’s a very different culture. They don’t give out film permits. We would be setting up a scene and people would just walk right through the set.

"I had this one guy, I thought he said he was me. I didn’t know what that meant.

"I wanted to shoot in Shibuya, which is the most crowded place in Tokyo. The cops, they’re all so polite, so it takes 10 minutes for them to come over and kick you out. They shut us down, I’d gotten all my shots, but I didn’t know they were going to arrest me."

Justin Lin pressed ahead with filming anyway (Frazer Harrison/Getty Images)

Then, by a stroke of genius on Universal's part, the fake director took the fall and even spent a night in jail so the cameras could continue rolling.

Lin continued: "Another guy stepped up and said, ‘I’m the director.’ I found out that it was his job to take the fall for me.

"He went to jail for the night and I’m forever grateful.”

Although he managed to capture some footage that was used in the final cut, most of the Shibuya sequence was created with special effects while the rest of the movie was filmed across California, where Lin could stay out of trouble.

Reacting to the mastermind stunt, users on Reddit joked that the team 'probably ran the numbers and realized it was more financially sound to pay someone to spend a night in jail than to make the scene appear to be in Japan during post production', to which another fan added: "As if Hollywood accountants are strangers to asking, 'Have you considered...crime?'"

Another added: "[Today I learned] to be arrested is now a profession."

A third chimed: "This just adds a whole new level of cool to the movie. Guess I'll have to watch it again."