Wednesday, July 24, 2013

Rush Hour 3 (2007)

I know that nobody but me really cares to draw a comparison with the Jackie Chan and Chris Tucker movies and the Jackie Chan and Owen Wilson movies, but hey it's my blog and if you don't like, write a comment. Sheesh. What was I saying? Oh yeah so this came out after the Shanghai Noon/Knights movies, actually several years after them. I'm not sure if it's because the movies with Chan and Wilson were Westerns of if it's just that Chan and Tucker play off each other better, at least as far as the box office dollar is concerned, but people seemed to want a third Rush Hour film more than they wanted a third Shanghai film. I've got to say that if I were going to pick which series to continue to build on after the second movie, I would have chosen the Rush Hour franchise as well. Oh sure, I would watch more of either, but I'm glad it's this one.
Remember that formula for the Rush Hour movies that I revealed? Well, they only used part of it this time. As soon as you see the elderly, rich, white man, you know he's the bad dude. They completely dropped the other half, of having a third partner who was female and Latina (or any other non-caucasian ethnicity). The third leg, who is comic relief this time around and only saves the two stars almost accidentally at the very end. That didn't work very well for me, and did I mention that he's a white guy? The part of the story he is in takes place in Paris, but Paris is a culturally diverse city.
The movie fell short in other areas as well, but not in the action even though there was noticeably less of it than last time around. Chan and Tucker are on their game as always, but the rest of the story is seriously wanting. And I must admit that I am glad that I only have 3 of these to watch - I couldn't handle doing a Rush Hour 4 based on the trajectory that this installment sends the franchise along.

Rush Hour 3 on IMDb

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