Jason Statham stars once again as the famous Transporter, Frank Martin in the third Transporter film. With him once again is the French inspector Tarconi, who not only provides the film with a bit of comic relief, also serves to help Frank stay one step ahead of the bad guys. Transporter 3 starts opening up the mythos of the group of Transporters, by somewhat introducing another one of Frank's co-workers, who is headed away from Ibiza with a beautiful woman (played by sexy newcomer Natalya Rudakova) in the passenger side of his car. Unfortunately this co-worker meets a relatively early untimely end, and it's up to Frank to pick up the slack.
The catch this time around is that Frank and his traveling companion are wearing state of the art explosive bracelets, which will go off if either of them drifts further than 75 feet away from Frank's gorgeous Audi. The bracelet does a good job of keeping Frank tethered to his car, but the film, and Frank's employer this time around, does an even better job of trying to keep him away from it. The action scenes are over the top, as is par for the course for this series, but that doesn't mean it's boring or too much of the same. There's actually a scene where Frank has to chase after his car on a bike, which is something I don't think i've seen in an action film before. My only complaint with the action was that, after Transporter 2, it seemed like this movie was a bit lacking in the hand to hand fight scenes. There's an amazing driving scene that takes place between Frank in his Audi, and a few bad guys in a Mercedes that has a bit of a surprising mid-way “climax” to it that I haven't seen since the Arnold Schwarzenegger/Danny DeVito movie Twins.
The only real downside to the movie besides the (in my opinion) lack of hand to hand combat was the “romance.” Frank's traveling partner Valentina, who is the daughter of a high profile environmentalist, starts off being very quiet, but opens up as the movie goes on, and eventually becomes his love interest. In the beginning of the movie, it's obvious she's a typical spoiled/party girl, and is a direct opposite to the way Frank acts. She does her best to act like the wild child she is and bring out the same in Frank. This was the only part of the movie where I found her character to be unbelievably annoying. I understand they were trying to do something a bit different, but I couldn't help but want the painful scenes of her dancing at a gas station and behaving like an all around “bad girl” to end and for the movie to get back to the pulse pounding action. As i'm sure anyone who's seen the previous movies will know, this is one of those movies where you shut your brain off, try not to think too much, and just sit back to enjoy the action.
Overall, if you're looking for a movie to kill a few hours, and love a good action scene, this movie is worth checking out, but as with the previous movies, don't expect anything mindblowing (outside of the action, of course)
Grade:
B-
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