Movie Review: The Transporter

Ever hear of a guilty pleasure? It's something we patently know is bad for us, yet we indulge for the sheer thrill of it. I mean, hello? Britney Spears? She lipsynchs her concerts people!

And yet I know all the words to "Toxic."

Or better, COPS on Fox.

It's been on for 15 years, I believe. It's basically human scum at it's worst and I still tune in when there's nothing else on.

Help.

This brings me to my guilty pleasure. I've got several, and I'm sure if you read enough reviews, you'll hit on most of them. But for me? Martial arts movies. Hong Kong triads. Kill Bill. Drunken Master.

I can't get enough of them. It's one of the reasons I love Netflix. Their search engine can drag up some of the most out of the way titles from my texts.

Yes. I do have texts about martial arts movies.

See what I mean? I'm hooked.

I bring this up because I stumbled across this title from said search engine and it brought up some cool pieces. Luc Besson, the writer created one of my personal faves, Kiss of the Dragon by Jet Li. ALso, the lead in this movie, Jason Stratham was in another personal fave of mine, The One. Luc even wrote the Fifth Element, I figured I would give it a try.

My mistake. YOu know how your mother told you try aspargus saying, "you'll never know until you try"? Then you tried gagged and vomited and never trusted her manipulations again?

Well, I gagged on the Transporter.

Look, I gotta explain a few things about really good martial arts formulas: they have a variety of rules, which you start to pick up on after a few gazillion. Like:

1. Plot? Not really. It serves as something that carries to from fight scene to fight scenes.
2. Fight scenes. Screw reality. No one breaks out into song when they are happy and no one needs to do a roundhouse side kick when a bullet is free from the current government. They should be long and waaaay coooooool
3. Cool. Interpret that as style. You gotta have a style, something that makes you worth looking at. I don't mean like knowing the Wing Chung Tai Chi soft form. I mean, you move like you've been kicking rears since the age of -2. I mean, you have that expression the same throughout the entire fight scene (see-Jet Li) or not even own sweat glands (see Chow Yun Fat). That's style. That's coolness.


The reason I list these, is, you guessed it, so I can rip them apart.

The Transporter starts out well enough with an excellent car chase. Not really a staple in Martial Arts flicks but exciting.

Then the plot kicks in.

And keeps going.

Then we see Jason kicking butt!

But, remember the second bit above? It ends in a few seconds.

And the plot comes back.

And stays. And develops.

And keeps going. And then there's some more.

By the time, the protagonist gets his mad on and starts to whoop tuchus, I'm snoozing wondering what's in the latest Entertainment Weekly.

Sad really.

Worse? The lead. Poor Jason. My guess is that he made buds with Jet Li and went to Paris with him after making "the One and worked out a deal of his own. He appeared next in The Italian Job as Handsome Rob and was very appropriate in a same, fun role. Then they gave him this. Did he really think he could be a martial artist? The only comparison I could think of is Clint Eastwood in Paint Your Wagon. You see, Clint can't sing. He looked like an actor trying to do something.

Ditto here. Jason looks like a martial artist but does have that coolness factor we were talking about earlier. It was laughable really, watching him do these fight scenes. You see him hit, pause and wait for the edit. No fluidity.

Something should also be said about his chest. His pectorals, IMHO, should have gotten a credit in the movie. He takes off his shirt no less then three different times. I read somewhere that he used to be a diver.

Is Sea World hiring? Because if he keeps making crap like this, it might be good for him to have a back-up plan.