Urk.

Rating: Null/10 (19 October 2002)

Some spoilers included.
The Transporter had these brief moments where you thought to yourself, "Well, it isn't going to be any kind of intelligent movie, but at least it will be passibly entertaining." Then the movie would wander from averagely dull to amazingly s**tty.
The Transporter didn't have any "big name stars" and that was a plus... as watching Keanu Reeves or Tom Cruise "act" their way through the film would have been torture. With more of an unknown in the lead (Jason Statham who has starred in Snatch, Ghosts of Mars and The One) you wind up hoping for the best: that the actor will tap into some hidden pool of talent and really deliver in the performance. This never really takes place. Statham looks cool enough shooting and kicking people, but this will only take you so far. While the plot at first seems to be trying something interesting, before long it becomes obvious that the writer just watched a bunch of other action films over the last five years and cut and pasted them together to make his movie. Again, this wouldn't be a problem if the film wasn't so bad in places. There is a difference between going to see something very clever and going to see something fun. Your hopes for "clever movie" vanish within a few minutes, but it takes about twenty for you to realize that you're not even going to get fun.
The film begins copying the Saint, with Statham playing the role of disillusioned military guy Frank Martin who has gone to work as a transporter of goods. Any kind of goods. The gimmick is that Statham doesn't ask questions about the cargo, and as long as you (a) pay the fee and (b) give precise instructions you're good to go. Statham has three rules, first "don't change the deal". Second, "no names". Third, "never look at/in the cargo". So of course, the movie follows the plotline of establishing that Statham is great at what he does and that makes him a cold and unemotional person, until he breaks all of his rules and becomes a nice guy concerned with saving the world.
Like most good action films, all it takes is a nice ass to get our hero to renounce his evil ways and become a decent guy. The shift is pretty abrupt too, as not less than ten minutes earlier in the film we see Statham happily killing two policemen and stuffing them in the truck. The plotline of "killer with the heart of gold turned to the good side of the force thanks to a nice ass" has been used several thousand times in the past, and it's no more interesting here. In The Transporter the role of the nice ass is played by Qi Shu, who has been in a ton of international films. She's no better because of it. In her role, she gets to play wary captured victim turned happy housewife turned sex starved slut turned cold missionary for the people to helpless victim to daddy's girl to daddy's murderer. It's as logical a transformation as you can imagine.
There are several plot holes in the film... but does anyone really care? In a film like this you are often willing to overlook gaping plot holes in favor of just having a good time. When the good time doesn't deliver, you're left wondering what exactly you did get out of the movie. To help, here's a quick list:
1. François Berléand is decent in his role as the slightly suspecting police chief. One has memories of Pink Panther films, and at this stage in the film you're begging for any kind of relief... comedy or otherwise.
2. The opening car chase scene is almost fun. Of course, my BMW doesn't drive like that and never, ever will.
3. Unintentional comedy spots throughout the movie; the BMW is a super car that drives pel mel through the city and at one point leaps onto a semi-truck carrying other cars... but later in the film it gets a flat tire for no apparent reason. The guy has an amazing house and is very paranoid, but apparently didn't bother to invest in a security system. And on it goes...
4. The director tries to make fight scenes innovative, but has no real concept of what is interesting and what is goofy. The height of this comes as Statham beats up eight bad guys in a bus station by pouring oil all over them and the floor, and then putting bicycle foot pedals on his own feet so he alone can stand and fight.
The Transporter isn't a good movie. It isn't Blair Witch 2 bad, but it isn't good. When you finally get the full picture of what our hero is fighting against, and it turns out to be a couple hundred people sold into the slave trade who are stored in cargo bins... well, it's just hard to get excited about it. Over in Mission Impossible 2 they are giving you death viruses. In the James Bond films the bad guy is trying to blow up the world. In this one we get a group of people stuffed in the back of a semi-truck with their luggage. It looks more like an Saturday night on the Mexico border than any kind of evil plot.
Yeah, the movie has action. But it's often too goofy to really care about. Yeah, the movie has music, but going from classical to techno pop as the car races around the city isn't a charming mix. Yeah, the girl has a nice body... but it's hard to care when the acting is so god-awful. Which really sums up the whole film:
Hard to care.