Transporter 3: Action Without Leaving Your Car

Watching Transporter 3, I realized the film had everything Quantom of Solace was missing. It has a much better scene featuring cars and trains than Quantom had trying to get boats suspenseful. Then the car fell in the water and totally kicked Quantom's action. Not only did it have better action, but also better romance. The girl beside Martin, Frank Martin is more stylish and sexy than Camille of Quantom.

Transporter 3 is the third installment featuring Jason Statham as Frank Martin, an ex-special ops agent who works as a driver, no questions asked, no names given. This time, instead of hired, he's knocked on the back of the head and tied to the car. Himself and the package, the sexy Natalya Rudakova, are given bracelets that explode if they walk too far away from the car. Usually a gimmick to keep Frank from running away, it is instead part of the plot and action as Frank has to drive halfway across Europe. Someone steals the car and drives off, what is Frank to do? If you think outrunning a stolen car is impressive, you should see what he does after driving it off of a bridge.

You'll notice I barely touched the plot. All I've given you is the title character, a location, and a pretty girl. It sounds alot like what you could have figured out from the title and a quick IMDb.com search. In truth, there is nothing else to know except that Transporter 3 exceeded all expections in all areas. Very easily they could have put Frank in a room full of goons and grunted out the same rules while pulling Statham's fighting action, but instead they make a joke out of the rules, already broken in the first two movies and known by everyone the rules won't be kept for long in the third. Instead, they have fun. The rules become intentional punchlines.

The sexy girl in the passenger seat is more than eye candy for the male audience. At first, she's depressed, knowing when they reach their destination, the bad guys will try to kill them. She's sure they will, so she pouts. She's entertained when Frank fights. Yes, he takes off his clothes like he has done in previous movies, all so he can strangle guys with his shirt sleeves, but this time he has the female audience in the car, grinning at the show. On the road, she lightens up, takes drugs, and drinks. Talk about a different approach to death. Frank is worried about dying, focused on getting out of it, she wants to party like it's her last day alive.

Remember when I mentioned it was better than Bond? Her name is Valentina, she parties, and (in my opinion as a guy) she made freckles sexy again. How many movies bring a sexy girl WITH an original look?

Back to the action... He can't leave the car, so what will he do when drives off of a bridge, landing on the water below? The answer is impressive, almost believable. After getting his car back on dry land and running again, I didn't care about the impossibilities of driving the car onto a train, espically parking it on top of the train so he is close enough to fight the bad guys below. Nor did I care the bad guy probably would have had some kind of detonation device for the bracelet just in case. The bad guy seemed cocky enough to think such a safety measure wasn't necessary.

Is it entertaining? Although a slow start, it picks up, espically as it gets closer to the end.

Is it for everyone? Yes, although the young male audience will be its loyal fanbase.

Is it memorable? Yes. Statham in the car is like Schwarzenegger with a machine gun in the 80's. It sells and sells well. Statham is with driving what Jet Li is for high-flying martial arts and Van Damme for high-flying kicks. Although it might get old, he is more than a few movies fad.