The Transporter (SE)

If you need something transported, no questions asked, then Frank Martin is your man. He’s a badass with his car, and will do everything it takes to make sure your package arrives safely (or more accurately, not damaged, since “safe” doesn’t really fit into his criteria). Apparently, he’s also a master of kung-fu and has a second-degree black belt in “ass-kickery”. The rest of the story doesn’t really matter, but goes something like this: car chase, kung fu, explosion, love interest, explosion, car chase, kung fu, love interest, finale, happy ending.

What a mess. Cruddy dialogue, terrible pacing, dumb plot, odd directing choices; the list goes on and on. Yet I still liked the flick. I’m hard pressed to call THE TRANSPORTER a good movie, or even a decent one, but it does have a certain charming quality about it. Right from the start, the audience is thrown into a wonderfully frenetic action car chase, and it’s great, but the movie doesn’t have any plot to go along with the action. It just merrily hops along a laughably preposterous string of events, and then just lets the audience soak it all in. Normally I’m fine with this; I mean, what movie-goer doesn’t like an all-out action flick once in awhile, right?

The problem isn’t that movie has very little plot, it’s that the plot it does have is so poorly executed, and thus, makes even the action scenes less engaging than they should be. Despite this, the originality of the scenes keeps the movie from taking a spill into “shit-pile-of-the-year” material. Take for example a scene where Frank (or “The Transporter”) is fighting two goons; one of them grabs his shirt, which he slips out of and then uses as a weapon to cleverly tie the men up. Now shirtless, he continues on to a bunch of henchman, who happily attack the transporting mofo. Mr. Transporting Dude, however, is smart, and manages to let loose a whole lot of oil, covering everyone. He uses the oil to slip out of the baddies’ grips, and then kick their asses by sliding along the ground; it’s a pretty slick scene to say the least (Whooo! Go puns!). All of these scenes are obviously dumb, but they are also (in their own special way) very clever, and more importantly, fun as hell. It makes more sense when you watch the movie.

But, it’s not the action scenes that steal the show; it’s Jason Statham. He’s big, he’s bad, and he’s chock full of charisma. He’s also ready to kick some ass, which he does admirably. You may have seen him before, in movies like SNATCH, THE ITALIAN JOB, THE ONE, and many others. The difference is that now he’s the leading man, and thank god for it, cuz he’s awesome! To be honest though, the character himself is sort of a bore, which disconnects him from the audience, leaving Statham with very little to work with (yet he still manages to at least “seem” interesting). To make matters worse, the love interest is abysmal. Add to that horrendously awful dialogue, and you have quite a lot to cringe at. That said, if you are willing to forget the dumb plot and enjoy the even dumber (but still really cool) action scenes, then you will definitely want to check this flick out. Besides, this movie wasn’t made for its story; it was made for action, and lots of it.

Video: Presented in 2.35:1 Anamorphic Widescreen. The sharpness of some of the scenes is a little excessive, probably due to edge enhancement. Other than that, the picture is flawless, with no grain in sight and a perfect contrast of colors.

Audio: English 5.1 DTS, English 5.1 Dolby Digital Surround, and Spanish/French 2.0 Surround. THE TRANSPORTER boasts an aggressive audio track, with booming action scenes, pitch perfect music, and reasonably leveled dialogue. With such a dynamic track, all of the speakers are put to great use, and it shows.

Despite the “Special Delivery Edition” title, the extras here are only mildly better than the previous DVD release, which was decent. The only new things are the second making-of featurette, the storyboard comparison, and (if you count it) the “inside look” featurette.

Another tidbit worth noting is that, according to retailers, the DVD will include a free pass to see THE TRANSPORTER 2 when it comes out. Ahhhhh, there’s nothing better than the way producers are bastardizing American through marketing.

Commentary (with Jason Statham and producer Steven Chasman): Chasman covers things like casting and the odd directing set-up he had, while Statham discusses much of his stunt work. It’s light, humorous, and worth a listen for fans, but it’s nothing too special.

Featurettes:

• Behind the Scenes: The Transporter (34:54): This is a terrific documentary-style featurette with plenty of interesting behind-the-scenes footage and brief interviews with the actors. Worth watching.
• Making of The Transporter: Original Version (12:02): Standard. The only reason this is here is to prevent from anyone complaining that some extras have disappeared from the previous DVD release, or at least that’s the only reason I can think of.

Storyboard-to-Film Comparison (1:46): You can watch one of the action scenes in from three views: storyboard, final product, and side-by-side. Nothing exactly spectacular, but cool if you like this sort of thing.

Extended Fight Sequences (15:08 – with optional commentary): In the commentary, the director explains how these were cut in order to keep a PG-13 rating. So I guess now you can enjoy the original fight scenes in all their glory.

Inside Look – The Transporter 2 (10:02): This starts with just a trailer, but continues on with a standard making-of featurette, which is really just an extended preview.

There is also the Theatrical Trailer and a Preview.

Certainly not a movie to look to deep into, THE TRANSPORTER manages to cover its ass where it fails by throwing in a huge variety of cool action scenes. If you can look past its obvious flaws, like the horrendous dialogue, awkward pacing, and cringe-inducing love sub-plot, then it’s actually pretty fun. The extras aren’t too shabby either, so it’s worth a look.