Rush Hour 3
Nothing makes you appreciate the simple technical skill of making a generic movie than preceding it with Shoot Em Up. Rush Hour 3 on its own merits is pedestrian, simplistic, mildly funny, and painless. After seeing Shoot Em Up, Rush Hour 3 can also be appreciated for good camera work, talented stunts and fight choreography, and being just plain old linear. Say what you will about the entertainment value of Rush Hour 3 (and I really liked the first movie a lot), it was completely competently made. It also has a cool shot on the Eiffel Tower, so…
Jackie Chan is 53 years old, and while he still has the catlike grace and the strength he’s always had, we just have to accept the cuts to allow for stuntmen and the long shots that allow for wires. The Rush Hour movies have not always been centrally focused on Chan’s legendary physical prowess, anyway, but on the back-and-forth of him and Chris Tucker (35). Rush Hour 3 does not give us that much of their buddy buddy vibe, except when the ladies are involved, and I missed it. The movie is stolen from the dynamic duo by a French cabbie named George (Yvan Attal), who loves and hates Americans and who has a great little story arc all his own. If Rush Hour 3 had somehow just been allowed to be about him, I would miss our star boys, but it would have been much more engaging. Let’s hear it for Attal!
The fights were well-choreographed (I could find no credit online for who did it but I hoped it was Jackie) and the plot ambled along well enough, though I honestly can’t remember what it was. It was benign with bursts of action comic and serious. The dialogue was littered with enough profanity that it was clearly meant for the franchise’s original adult audience, but the story and jokes were definitely looking for the summer kids hoping to see an “adult” action movie.
One thing this movie had going for it that was subtle but extremely enjoyable: Music by Lalo Schifrin. That guy scores like it’s the end of the world. Max Von Sydow is giving a speech somewhere for some reason, and while it might as well have been on tariffs or toll booths, the score imagined ninjas climbing down the walls on suction cups with knives in their mouths. Hilarious!
Maybe if director Brett Ratner and Schifrin had done Shoot Em Up it would have worked better; here they had a tired franchise which could no longer sustain itself, but perfect technical competence in all other areas. As it is, we just have to wave sadly to Jackie and Chris as Yvan drives them off into the sunset.
MPAA Rating PG-13
Release date 8/10/07
Time in minutes 90
Director Brett Ratner
Studio New Line Cinema
