Thursday, April 3, 2025
Basic
Tuesday, April 1, 2025
Gotti
Monday, March 31, 2025
From Paris with Love
1 watched on Hulu: Blacklight
Sunday, March 30, 2025
Transporter 3
Year 17, Day 89 - 3/30/25 - Movie #4,982
BEFORE: OK, I am back from Bermuda, we had a great time aboard a cruise ship for 5 days. Sightseeing, drinking and especially eating - the food on the ship was top-notch, we had access to the main restaurants, a specialty restaurant based on our suite class, and then we had vouchers for two specialty restaurants, one was French and one was a churrascaria. Then we also had access to the ship's buffet (which was not 24/7, but pretty darn close) so I was able to squeeze in a few meals between our other meals. Prime rib, coq au vin, lobster deviled eggs, scallops, crab cakes, shrimp fettucine alfredo, and then at the buffet I found ribs, fried chicken on waffles, and infinite breakfasts. So yeah, I definitely gained a few pounds, and now I'm going to have to work it off at the job I have left. Being on vacation took some of the sting out of losing one job, but I know that life on a cruise ship is not reality, and that in a few days I'd have to come back and try to put my career back on track somehow - it's a work in progress.
Bermuda was fine, we took a bus tour and got some sun (and sunburn), went to one beach, but there was no time to swim and anyway I don't do that. The bumpy bus took us up to St. George's and then ended in Hamilton for some shopping, only the ship had delayed our excursion day and we ended up leaving the boat an hour later than planned, so by the time we were released for shopping, there was no time for shopping, a line was already starting to gather for the ferry that would return us to the cruise ship pier, so we figured we'd better get in it, or we'd miss that ferry and possibly the next one as well. Sure, we still had another half day in Bermuda, but we used that time to explore the port and a nearby pub, then again make our way back to the ship two hours before the boarding cut-off, because why take any chances with that?
There were some entertaining things to do on the ship, I won both beer trivia and superhero trivia, which got me signatures on my activity card that I could trade in for a free souvenir deck of cards at the end of the cruise. And we saw one show at the theater on Deck 8, a jukebox musical called "The Choir of Man" - it was fine, but I think that some people are mainly drawn to it for the free beer offered from the pub set before the show begins. But mostly we just enjoyed being spoiled, we had a butler who helped us get the show tickets and also brought us more snacks to the room, which is a bit like giving your kids sugar and then wondering why they can't settle down to go to sleep. But we earned a vacation and we deserved a vacation, and we hadn't been on a cruise since 2013.
Jason Statham carries over from "Crank: High Voltage", and I'll have to cap the Statham movies at four, because I don't have time to get to the theaters this weekend and watch "Working Man", plus that would throw off my count - I'm going to just make it to my Easter movie as it is - maybe I've got one day's leeway in case I get very busy in early April.
FOLLOW-UP TO: "Transporter 2" (Movie #4,831)
THE PLOT: Frank Martin is forced to deliver Valentina, the kidnapped daughter of a Ukrainian government official, from Marseilles to Odessa. En route, he has to contend with thugs who want to intercept Valentina's safe delivery.
AFTER: I knew last year that there was a third "Transporter" movie, however it wasn't running on cable at the time. Sure, I could have watched it some other way (pirate site) but I was already watching so many Statham movies, I even crammed in a double feature on Labor Day weekend just to get to the ones that I did watch. Something told me to hold off on the third one, and that turned out to be the right call, because it happens to link me to the next section of films, which is going to get me to Easter Sunday. In two days I'll print the links to Easter, but I just won't have the links to the end of April yet, because at some point in April when I get a minute I need to work out the chain to Mother's Day, that's just how this works.
Ah, yes, Frank Martin, the guy who delivers packages and has three simple rules to follow, which I think he then proceeds to break in every film, right? Then he gets to talk about the fact that he's breaking his own rules, which is good for a few beats in every movie, too. I feel you, Frank, I lived by some simple rules, too - like "Don't teach your co-workers how you do what you do." Yep, I broke that one, and it cost me. Maybe the second one was "Don't ever call the boss stupid." Yep, I broke that one, too, and it cost me big-time. I can't really think of a third rule I had, maybe it should have been "Don't stay in the same job for over thirty years." Hey, I just don't like job-hunting, it's a pain in the ass. That job helped pay for a condominium and then a house, so at least there was some benefit in staying in the same place for way too long. Now I just have to figure out what to do next, because I'm still too young to retire. Keep the other job while I look for another one, I guess.
But let's focus on the movie here. This one kind of has it all, from toxic waste disposal to blackmailing a Ukrainian official by kidnapping his daughter. And way back in 2008 none of us even really knew about Ukraine, right? Except that it was a territory in the board game Risk...I mean, it was ONE of the Soviet Socialist Republics on the old map, but there were like 47 of them, so except for liking Chicken Kiev, nobody really gave Ukrainian culture a second thought, except for the Ukrainians, I guess. But that official's daughter needed to be transported back to Odessa, do you see where this is going? Frank had that rule about transporting people, so he apparently referred the kidnappers to his colleague, Malcolm, who managed to get shot somewhere along the way, so instead of Budapest, he could only drive as far as Frank Martin's house. Well, Frank did say Malcolm could "crash" there any time, but I don't think he meant that literally.
This is a different spin on the "bomb in a car" trope, technically the bomb is in the car, but it's in the form of two metal bracelets on the wrists of the passenger and the transporter. If they get too far from the car, the bracelets blow up. If they try to dismantle the bracelets, they blow up. And if they disobey any orders from the kidnappers, well, you get the idea. Still, bomb in a vehicle, so it's yet another variation on the "Speed" formula. If only Malcolm could have explained to Frank what the bracelet rules were, but no, he had to be unconscious, and the kidnapped girl was asleep in the back seat, so the poor EMTs pulled Malcolm from the car, and their ambulance blew up as they were driving him to the hospital. Frank gets knocked unconscious, only to find that HE is now wearing one of the bracelets, and he's got to complete the transporter job, getting Valentina to Budapest. Even worse, they rigged up that great car that Frank had with the revolving license plates, I mean, you just don't mess with a man's ride, or so I've heard.
Now Frank has an ax to grind, revenge is on his mind, and there's nothing more exciting than a Jason Statham character motivated to get stuff done. Once he hits Budapest, one of the bad guys steals the car with Valentina in it, which basically means Frank's got a limited amount of time before he blows up, so he gets on a BICYCLE and chases after the car. After a few bike stunts and a shortcut through a warehouse, he manages to catch up (??) with his Audi and dive into the car, simultaneously pushing the henchman out the other door, and not missing a damn beat, he's back on the road in his own car doing 80 mph without blowing himself up.
Then he maneuvers the car of henchmen chasing him off a cliff, so THEY blow up real good, and gains the trust of Valentina by stripping for her and having sex with her. Hey, it's a rough job but somebody's got to do it. She finally spills her backstory, how she was partying in Ibiza and somebody slipped her a roofie, then ended up with the explosive jewelry to blackmail her father into accepting that cargo ship with all the toxic waste into his country, or something. I don't know, that part's a bit unclear, but I assume the bad guys are PRO toxic waste dumping and the Ukrainian minister is against it, hence the need for the kidnapping and blackmail. Look, I'm sure Valentina's a special girl and all that, but she's very difficult to work with and also closed off emotionally, still it's better than being Russian. Right?
OF COURSE Frank delivers Valentina as promised - and OF COURSE the bad guys double-cross him and try to kill him. That's why he doesn't get much repeat business, there's a big problem with client relations here - if you run jobs for dishonest people, you should pretty much expect they'll try to screw you in the end. And if they kill you, well, then they don't have to pay you. That's a free pro tip to keep in mind. Both ends of the bridge are blocked (one end with the dumpster full of toxic waste, nice touch...) so Frank chooses to do the unexpected and drive his car off the bridge and into the lake. How he survives under water when his detective friend is over 10 minutes away is pure genius - further proof that Jason Statham could be and should be the next James Bond. (Supposedly he is kind of suggesting himself for the part.)
Whew, Frank survives and more importantly, his Audi survives, he's going to need it to catch up with the villains and Valentina on that train. I'm willing to bet you haven't seen anyone board a train the way Frank does either. We can only hope that after the bad guys die and the good guys live that the car is going to be all right.
This was the most successful film in the "Transporter" franchise, as it did take in $109 million worldwide - but reviews were mixed, ranging from "a perfectly acceptable brainless action thriller" to "terrifically stupid fun" and "it's enough to pass the time." Yes, this will pass 104 minutes of your time, but critics were also split on lead actress Natalya Rudakova, some noting that her romantic scenes were "not particularly charming or sexy" and others noting the delivery of her lines as "phonetic readings", meaning she technically was making the correct sounds, only maybe she was lacking in understanding them or the emotions behind them. Roger Ebert even said, "Well, she's no Bonnie Hunt." Nope, I'm afraid not, only would you want to see Bonnie Hunt having sex with Jason Statham in a field close to a bomb-rigged car? Maybe you would, you sicko.
Directed by Olivier Megaton (director of "Colombiana")
Also starring Natalya Rudakova, Francois Berléand (last seen in "Transporter 2"), Robert Knepper (last seen in "Jack Reacher: Never Go Back"), Jeroen Krabbé (last seen in "An Ideal Husband"), Alex Kobold, David Atrakchi, Yann Sundberg, Eriq Ebouaney (last seen in "3 Days to Kill"), David Kammenos, Silvio Simac (last seen in "John Wick: Chapter 3 - Parabellum"), Oscar Relier, Timo Dierkes, Paul Barrett (last seen in "The Queen"), Katia Tchenko, Michel Neugarten, Farid Elouardi, Julien Muller (last seen in "Colombiana"), Arnaud Gibey, Guillaume Nail, Venugopal Balakrishnan, Semmy Schilt
RATING: 6 out of 10 55-gallon drums