 "Photo: Glen Wilson / New Line Cinema")
The Hollywood studios set out to make the summer of 2007 the definitive year for some of their most lucrative franchises. Called "the year of the three-quels," 2007 stamped out some big names in the film industry - "Spider-Man," "Pirates of the Caribbean" and "Ocean's Eleven," among others, all went out with a bang this year. "Rush Hour 3" catches us at the curtails of the summer season, but you definitely won't see people lining up for the midnight show.
In "Rush Hour 3," returning stars Chris Tucker as Detective James Carter and Jackie Chan as Chief Inspector Lee reunite in Los Angeles, where Carter has been demoted to a downtown traffic officer and Lee is serving as a bodyguard to Chinese Ambassador Han. Han has come to L.A. to announce before the World Criminal Court the identities of the Chinese Triad - a worldwide network of organized crime and drug lords. An assassination attempt conveniently stops his revelation in mid-sentence, prompting Lee and Carter to begin an investigation that takes them to the Triad underground of Paris to pursue Han's would-be assassin while searching for the list of Triad bosses.
The first two "Rush Hour" scripts were suspenseful and intriguing as action stories while remaining impeccably artful works of comedy. Chan and Tucker managed to flawlessly dance the line between their respective cinematic roles, with Chan as the inquisitive combat expert and Tucker as the loudmouthed shoot-first blunderer. The resulting on-screen chemistry fascinated audiences, who celebrated the pair as a match made in Hollywood heaven. So what went wrong with number 3?
"RH3" is at its best in the action scenes. Director Brett Ratner gets creative with his car chases, urban rundowns and knife fights, and maximizes the many possibilities of a kung fu showdown on the Eiffel Tower. It's hard to believe that Jackie Chan, now in his 50s, can still wow audiences by performing his own stunt choreography.
Perhaps it's my own fault that I don't remember the martial arts in "Rush Hour 3" as much as the slapstick rebounds between detectives Lee and Carter. Writers really dropped the ball this time when it came to creating comic material. Scenes with all setup and no punch line seem to dominate this movie, loading it up with awkward pauses where the laugh track seems to be missing.
It's confusing and sad to see a powerful comedy series likely end with such a lackluster installment as "RH3." Where has the energy and excitement from the first movies gone? Why didn't Jackie Chan climb more walls, and why didn't Chris Tucker yell out "Oh damn!" more?
But ultimately, it betrays my personal code of ethics to steer my readership from Chris Tucker, whose flamboyant and openly stereotypical comedy drew us into movies like "Friday" and "Money Talks" before reaching its crescendo in the first Rush Hour films, so I can't tell his fans to not see "Rush Hour 3." To some, it doesn't matter if he's put on a little chub and is reading off a shoddy script-it's been 6 years since his last appearance on film, and some of us need our "damn!" fix.
