Same old traffic, different road -- Rush Hour 3
Rush Hour 3
Genre: Action
Cast: Jackie Chan, Chris Tucker, Noémie Lenoir
Director: Brett Ratner
Storyline: Inspector Lee and detective Carter go to Paris to take on the dangerous Chinese Triad.
Bottomline: Only the ambience changes, the action is just the same.
The funniest part of ‘Rush Hour 3’ was the slide at the beginning that showed the local distributor’s corny title card that read more like an obituary ad, with the mug shot. If only the rest of the movie was as hilarious and not as
cheesy.
What we get instead is another dose of the race stereotypes, borrowed jokes and stale situations, which you will only enjoy if you go with an open mind and an empty head.
It is surprising that ‘Rush Hour 3,’ in spite of being helmed by Brett ‘Prison Break’ Ratner, who directed the first part, is in no hurry to get to the plot. This is assembly line cinema at its laziest.
The script for ‘Rush Hour’ and its sequels were probably made up during a quick drive down an empty street: Two cops, an East-meets-West version of ‘Lethal Weapon’ or ‘Bad Boys,’ kick it (like the poster says) yet again, crack some jokes about each other’s race before showing off their respective talents — Chan with his gravity defying stunts with other Asian
stuntmen/women and Tucker with his loud-mouthed black American stand-up act.
Location is different
Hence, the only plot point that differentiates the third part from the first two is the location: Paris. The location dictates that the duo has to check out women at the cabaret, make friends with at least one French guy and hang-out at the Eiffel Tower, literally, for the stunts. Pretty predictable, indeed.
If you’ve seen ‘Dude Where’s My Car’ and ‘Austin Powers,’ you would’ve already got bored of the Mi/Me and Yu/You jokes. Else, you have something to laugh about.
So why would you want to watch this? For Jackie Chan, of course. We love Jackie for the guy he is, for his never-say-die spirit and love for action.
Who wants a plot when you can see Jackie still kicking it, right?
SUDHISH KAMATH
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