Review: Rush Hour 3 / Transformers
CHAN REACTION
The durable action star is back with another installment of his durable action franchise. Plus, an entertaining robot-invasion adventure.
AUG 17, 2007 - JACKIE CHAN AND CHRIS TUCKER have themselves a Butch-Sundance moment in Rush Hour 3, when, to shake off a pursuing posse, they take a deep breath and jump – but where the buddy-outlaws in the older film end up in raging river waters, the buddy-cops here end up in the smelly sewers of Paris. It would be all too easy to deconstruct this moment as proof that what we’re watching is simply a crappier rerun of older (and better) double-hero capers, but that’s just plain wrong; what we’re watching is a crappier rerun of older (and better) double-hero capers, but because it knows that it’s inherently crappy, it actually ends up being sort-of fun.
This self-awareness extends from the realisation that this is family entertainment and therefore cannot throw around too many swear words (sample cussing: “You tell this piece of S-word that I will personally F-word him up!�) to the acknowledgement of decades of film-studies theses which point out that these buddy movies are rife with homoeroticism. (When Chan and Tucker split up after a misunderstanding, Elton John’s Sorry Seems to Be the Hardest Word plays over images of them moping about in solitude, and when things get back to normal, they perform a duet of The Closer I Get to You.) And the appearance of Max von Sydow and Roman Polanski in those teeny-tiny roles is a not-so-subtle nudge that art-house heavyweights aren’t above a bit of self-defacement for some easy big-studio money, no?
The story has to do with the duo trying to protect an ambassador from being assassinated by the Triads, but the real attraction for those of us who’ve had near-religious experiences with Jackie Chan’s Hong Kong action-comedies is the man himself (though the motormouthed Chris Tucker has his moments too). In an early chase, Chan is in a navy-blue suit and tie, and as he clambers up poles, shimmies down sheer walls and scampers across freeways, he comes across as the world’s most dapper primate trapped in Hollywood’s petting zoo. You want to rip that tie off and set him free, far away from the concrete jungles his far-from-memorable American forays have had him trapped in, and return him to his home, to his Hong Kong environs. But then you also realise that it’s some two decades since he dazzled us with Project A and Armour of God, and if generic action-comedies like Rush Hour 3 are what it’ll take these days to get to see the ageing (yet still agile) Chan Man strut his stuff, that’s a small price to pay.
MICHAEL BAY ISN’T EXACTLY known for his sense of humour – we know him more for his sense of blowing things up – but the climactic action sequence of his robo-pic Transformers features what is surely the sight gag of the summer. (For those of us who’ve managed to navigate our childhoods without any awareness of the line of toys this film is based on, it’s simply a story about Good Robots versus Bad Robots, and the climax centres on the two battling it out for world domination… or, uh, something.) This battle is fought in the vicinity of a revival-house movie theatre playing a double-bill of A Place in the Sun and The Rose Tattoo, the former based on a novel by Theodore Dreiser, the latter on a Tennessee Williams play – and you can almost hear Bay rubbing his palms together and cackling with evil glee at the notion that the kind of films he makes have all but blown away, at least from the mainstream marketplace, those other types of movies, those gentler cinematic efforts of a more literary kind.
Films like Transformers owe their sensibilities not to published works but to previously-released movies, and a major portion of my enjoyment came from simply ticking off the various references – from Gremlins (Shia LaBeouf, a geeky young man living with his parents and dog in a peaceful suburbia, is about to have his life invaded by non-humans running amuck) to Christine (a car develops a fond relationship with its owner, at one point playing a song from The Cars – remember Who’s gonna drive you home? – to hint that the gorgeous girl he’s after is walking home alone and could use a lift) to E.T. (the Government hauls away a benign, oh-so-cute non-human to conduct tests on it) to Terminator 2 (the good machines versus the evil machines). But there’s also the vaguely scientific-sounding patter that’s always a riot (my favourite: “You need to move past Fourier transforms and start considering quantum mechanics.�) and some super-duper special effects, so there’s certainly fun to be had in Transformers. Just don’t expect it to be playing in a revival house in an action epic five decades hence.
Copyright ©2007 The New Indian Express
“but because it knows that it’s inherently crappy, …..”
How does that take away the crapiness?
JBJ, Main hoon na and now this - You are enjoying way too much of these crappy movies just because they are aware of how bad they are! I guess it must be some secret phenomena that only critics can experience and enjoy.
You are posting on a everyday business which is nice:)
Haven’t seen Rush Hour 3 yet, but the trailer left me less than amused. I find Chris Tucker extremely annoying, with an irritant factor that manages to cancel out even the Chan Man’s prodigious charm in certain scenes.And the punning joke on an Oriental surname (who are you? I am Yu) was old 25 years ago.
Transformers was, for me personally, a migraine inducing cacophony of noise. It had world class effects rubbished by the now text book Michael Bay method of shooting scenes like the cameraman was having an epileptic fit and driven to further incoherence by rapid fire editing tailored for chronic ADD sufferers. I’ll probably get it on DVD, play it at half speed to confirm if Optimus Prime and Megatron did in fact duke it out to the end or did they kiss, make up and have robot sex?
I’m glad you had time to tick off references Mr.B. My brains were too busy catching up to my eyes, and losing mostly:-)
> and you can almost hear Bay rubbing his palms together and cackling with evil glee at the notion that the kind of films he makes have all but blown away, at least from the mainstream marketplace, those other types of movies, those gentler cinematic efforts of a more literary kind.
And honestly you as a critic have played your role in encouraging the prolification of generic crap! :-0
Yesterday I was blown away by Deepa Mehta, Nandita Das, Aamir and co in 1947: Earth. This was a movie released during my college days and noone talks about how brilliant it really is when they talk with anyone associated with the film.
Except
http://www.manfrommatunga.com/1947.htm
“When I told a colleague of mine that I was going to see 1947-Earth this Sunday, he told me, “It seems to be an overrated film”. I asked him “Have you seen it?” He said “No.” (sic). However, implied was the fact that hyped movies these days are generally a letdown. Moreover, 1947-Earth comes with “off-beat” and “serious-movie” tags, which raise viewer defenses, since no one wants to be identified as a pseudo-intellectual or an “arty-farty” type, these days.”
I plead guilty. :-0
sachita: A tolerance for crap is a must for a critic, but if done well, even trash can be kinda fun - even if the “crappiness” still remains
But JBJ and MHN clubbed with this? Blasphemy!
KayKay: But that’s the way Bay always shoots, so where’s the shock/surprise element? That criticism reminds of those who keep knocking Karan Johar’s films. You’ve seen, say, K3G and if you hated it, what’s the point in going for Kabhi Alvidaa and hating that too? Wouldn’t it make more sense to simply stay away and watch something more attuned to your tastes? I think it works the same way for Bay. You know what you’re going to get, so the cuts and the noise are part of the deal. BTW, “if Optimus Prime and Megatron did in fact duke it out to the end or did they kiss, make up and have robot sex?” Some serious fantasy there
g: (1) 1947 is a great movie. I haven’t seen it in a while, but I remember being extremely impressed the first time I saw it. (2) But the fact that you think 1947 is great shouldn’t make you immune to less ambitious entertainers. (3) And reg. “you as a critic have played your role in encouraging the prolification of generic crap!” I’m afraid you attribute too much power to the critic, who - at least in this country - is a largely irrevelent factor in people’s decision to watch movies.
Baradwaj,
Padam summar than, expected something gr8. Chris tucker portion there were some good one liners.
I liked the Eiffel tower sections of the movie very well. I’d personally like to write to Mr.Shankar, that is really what i call *Bramandam* and not Shivaji
not a word about the product placement in Transformers? How could you?
(2) But the fact that you think 1947 is great shouldn’t make you immune to less ambitious entertainers.
It is great but it is also DEMANDING of me as a viewer. If I am wasting my time becoming easily amused by generic crap, then I am less likely to watch a 1947.
(3) I’m afraid you attribute too much power to the critic, who - at least in this country -
Both agree and disagree. In my way of thinking, If one does not linger on such a movie and like in the Trueman Show, one accords the same amount of time, thought and respect to generic crap as to this, then one IS guilty of obscenity.
Just my two cents!
>If I am wasting my time becoming easily amused by generic crap, then I am less likely to watch a 1947
Of course, the flip side IS that if all one does is watch movies like 1947 then their real impact and real relevance will be lost on one.
Srivatsan: Sumaar padams are what the Rush Hour films are. So I wasn’t very surprised that this was just about an average watch.
George: “product placement”? What? Where? When I was a kid, I played with a Meccano set that rusted up in two months. Me no know about Hasbro toys.
I was a Transformers fan as a kid, and so this movie was a must watch. What a smelly turd this is! Anyone who is thinking about renting/watching this, I can only say: check out the 1985 animated Transformers: The Movie instead, for a more sophisticated plot, for characters you can feel for, and pulse-pounding action. No kidding.
Megatron’s a PLANE in this movie?! WTF?! Optimus Prime has LIPS?! Kalyug hai Kalyug.
The one aspect of the Bay movie that is hard to surpass is, of course, Megan Fox…