Directed By: Olivier Megaton
This is the plot summary for Transporter 3 as explained on www.imdb.com:
Frank Martin puts the driving gloves on to deliver Valentina, the kidnapped daughter of a Ukranian government official, from Marseilles to Odessa on the Black Sea. En route, he has to contend with thugs who want to intercept Valentina's safe delivery and not let his personal feelings get in the way of his dangerous objective.
What the F*&!? This plot is as thin as melted butter. And this is number 3! It’s the same plot as numbers 1 and 2! If Jason Statham thinks this is his redemption for doing Death Race, then he’s on the same crack as the studio execs that green lit this picture.
The only way I’m going to watch this movie is if I can suddenly induce a comma by drinking 10 bottles of Soju in which case I’m admitted into a dungeony, old public Korean hospital and strapped to the bed as I twitch of fever and formaldehyde poisoning and finally, when I’ve calmed because of the necessary lobotomy, the nurse turns on the green color-cast Zenith TV and sticks in a cheap, old bootleg of Transporter 3 in which you can hear the dude who pirated it eating popcorn.
Jason Statham must be weeping. Daniel Craig, his fellow action star and countryman, is garnering Golden Globe and Oscar attention for his role in Ed Zwick’s “Defiance,” not to mention a steady reputation as a moneyman in another successful installment of the Bond franchise in 2008’s Quantum of Solace. And what is Statham doing? Transporter 3.
I always think of Statham as his character “Bacon” in Guy Ritchie’s 1998 genre-defining, fast-paced gangster flic “Lock Stock & Two Smoking Barrels.” But Statham’s even more memorable as “Turkish” in Ritchie’s more successful second effort, 2000’s “Snatch,” with Brad Pitt as a Pike boxer.
Not bad when your first two roles turn out to be in very successful films that actually launch your career. And I hoped for big things for Statham, just as I did for the entire cast of the Band of Brothers, the majority of which was British. I like the idea of the British action star, a little bit country, a little bit rock’n’roll, a little bit metro-sexual, a little bit trained, sociopathic, lethal weapon. Somehow it just works. I guess that’s the appeal of James Bond. Oh wait. I forgot, I’m talking about Statham and The Transporter 3. Damn, I want to watch Daniel Craig right now kill that guy in the beginning of Casino Royal. The sink just falls apart after he rams the bad guy’s head through it. It’s incredible.
Alas, the early part of the decade was the best part of it for most of these British actors. Most of the Band of Brothers cast has been scattered to the wind and Statham started doing The Transporter movies in 2002. Perhaps that’s the problem with the whole character of Frank Martin, Statham’s character in The Transporter. He’s not James Bond. But he’s subtly suave. He’s not an assassin, but he’s ex-military. He’s a character always struggling with what he does and what he’s capable of doing. And perhaps for the first movie that was a strong enough twist to fall back on. But this is number 3. Statham’s character should know by now, when he drives people around, he gets into trouble and has to kill a lot of ineffectual bad guys. Seriously, didn’t Bruce Willis kill the same longhaired, incompetent thugs in 1988? At least Die Hard was nominated for four Oscars. Studios have to have a lot of confidence to go after a number 3. But then again, trilogies are all the rage again. Does any one else feel like it’s the mid-1980s?
Congratulations Statham. You join a special group of trilogies with disappointing third installments. Lethal Weapon 3, Return of the Jedi (and all of the new Star Wars films for that matter), Back to the Future 3, X-Men 3, and to some extent Spider Man 3 and The Lord of The Rings 3. (I’m sure I’m missing some). Even the Bourne series was stretching it with the third Installment, The Bourne Ultimatum. What ultimatum, Jason Bourne kills everyone. There’s no ultimatum.
The character of Frank Martin needs some new motivation. Action movies, after all, are solely based upon the heroin’s motivation for blowing stuff up and kicking some ass. There at least has to be some internal struggle, where the heroine tries to cope with who they are, what they’re doing, how they want to change or how they will overcome their personal and professional challenges.
The soldiers in the Band of Brothers were fighting fascism and tyranny, while struggling with their own mortality, patriotism and fear of letting their fellow soldiers down. James Bond is an elite assassin who fights terrorism in an ambiguous and dangerous post-Cold War reality. The new films with Daniel Craig have Bond struggling to remain emotionally unattached as he continues to be responsible for collateral damage and the death of perhaps the first genuine love interest in any Bond film. Stop playing coy Statham, get rid of this phony ‘good guy- put-upon’ persona, and come out and kick some real ass.
So let’s revisit the plot summary one more time for The Transporter 3. Frank Martin, Jason Statham, drives really fast in a black car, kills people with any object present, ala Jason Bourne, gets semi-romantically involved with a piece of spent-Euro-jet-trash, tries to not compromise his strict ethical and moral code all the while reluctantly solving a lame-ass plot of international intrigue, miraculously surviving to drive another day.
If anyone is hung-over enough one Sunday to actually pay to see this movie and feels like sharing some details, drop me a line in the comment section. I’m going to go and watch a little James Bond: Casino Royal.
