T w e n t y S i d e d
Some thoughts on The Transporter 2:
The term “former special forces” has become movie shorthand for “is invincible and has magical powers, but only cool ones and not gay like that Sailor Moon crap.”
Dear writers: Poisons have antidotes, diseases have cures, and viruses have vaccines. (The latter must be administered before exposure.) Please try to get this straight in your head before you build a movie around one of these things.
I know action movies are not murder mysteries. We’re not supposed to think too hard about the plot, which is usually nonsense. But is it too much to ask that the movie at least make sense from moment to moment? We’ve embraced the conceit that Jason Statham Can Do Anything, now all you need is some excuse to chain a bunch of stunts and fights together.
In one scene the hero runs up to a moving truck, leaps up onto the hood, climbs to the top, and onto the bridge overhead. A cool enough idea. Takes about four seconds of screen time. Jackie Chan would do this move for real, while delivering dialog, on fire, holding a baby, and they would show this to us in one unbroken take. In this movie they do about four or five flashing, slamming cuts that change angles in dizzying ways while doing this little stunt. Fine, I understand we can’t expect Jason Statham to do this, but could they at least try to convince me that someone did the stunt?
This movie wants to be a Hong Kong chop-sockey flick in the worst way. They have a fight where the hero is swinging around on a “rope”, fighting. (like Jet Li in Romeo Must Die) They have a fight where he uses a firehose. (also used in Romeo Must Die.) At another point he puts two solid but ridiculous objects on his hands and uses them to fight. (Jackie Chan, in lots of his movies.) There are winks and nods to other Hong Kong films throughout this thing, but this only serves to remind us how Chinese stars tend to do their own stunts and do them better, without the aid of editing.
The filmmakers have gotten it into their heads that when filming an action sequence it is important to keep the camera moving around at all times, preferably vertically. The best way to do this is to 1) Hire the cameraman from The Blair Witch Project, 2) Get him very drunk, and then 3) Hire someone else to punch him in the crotch repeatedly while he’s trying to film.
And yes, if they make a Transporter 3: The Most Transportingest I’ll probably end up watching it. Shut up.
