| | | Locked. Loaded. Ready to Roll.
Features: Widescreen, English, Subtitled, French, Spanish
Frank Martin has been pressured into transporting Valentina, the kidnapped daughter of Leonid Vasilev, the head of the Environmental Protection Agency for the Ukraine, from Marseilles through Stuttgart and Budapest until he ends up in Odessa on the Black Sea. Along the way, with the help of Inspector Tarconi, Frank has to contend with the people who strong armed him to take the job, agents sent by Vasilev to intercept him, and the general non-cooperation of his passenger. Despite Valentina's cynical disposition and his resistance to get involved, Frank and Valentina fall for each other, while escaping from one life-threatening situation after another.
"..."Mission: Impossible" meets "Speed": high-tech gizmos, exotic European locales, and hair-raising stunts..." Andrea Gronvall, Chicago Reader
"The villainous Polluter-in-Chief is eloquently played by Robert Knepper, familiarly loathsome as T-Bag on Fox's "Prison Break."" Lisa Schwarzbaum, Entertainment Weekly
"Adrenaline-freak heaven!" Michael Sragow, Baltimore Sun
"...the production has the polish and pace that producer/co-writer Luc Besson's work is known for." Mike Mayo, The Washington Post
"Statham isn't an actor who coasts, not even in a recklessly enjoyable picture like Transporter 3." Stephanie Zacharek, Salon.com
Editor's Note
Combining Western-style car chases and Hong Kong-inspired fight sequences choreographed by martial arts legend Cory Yuen, the Luc Besson-created TRANSPORTER films have found international success as a sort of working-class James Bond series. Jason Statham, who has become the go-to guy for big-budget B-movie thrills, returns once again as Frank Martin, the driver-for-hire for whom no job is too risky. Brimming with the usual jaw-dropping stunts, this is another crowd-pleasing entry in the saga, delivered at a brisk and flashy clip by director Olivier Megaton. Following the coercion of Ukrainian environmental official Leonid Vasilev (Jeroen Krabbe) into signing papers permitting the shipping of toxic materials into a harbor by criminal mastermind Johnson (Robert Knepper), Frank Martin is forced into accepting the job of driving Vasilev's kidnapped daughter, Valentina (Natalya Rudakova)--acting as human collateral--from Marseilles to the Black Sea coastal city of Odessa. On the chance the Martin should attempt to flee, Johnson has rigged him with a bracelet that will detonate if he strays more than 75 feet from his car. When Valentina is intercepted by a rival group, Martin will have to push his Audi M8 to the limit to complete his mission and ensure his own survival. The TRANSPORTER films require copious amounts of suspension of disbelief, but then again, one doesn't hope they will strictly adhere to the laws of physics. The third volume provides ample thrills, not the least of which is the sight of a car driving off a bridge onto a moving train. Plenty of screen time is also given to Statham's superhumanly chiseled torso, while freckled Rudakova's unconventional beauty balances out the sex appeal. In the end, Statham's undeniable likeability propels the film, and his chemistry in a handful of scenes with François Berleand, returning as Inspector Tarconi, provides some nice comic moments.
| Features | BD Live: MoLog - The First BD Live Application That Allows Users To Insert & Animate Shapes, Text, Audio, & Other Graphics Right Into The Film To Create "Blogs" To Share With Other MoLog Users! | | Audio Commentary With Director Olivier Megaton | | Audio: English DTS HD 7.1 Surround Sound | | Audio: French Dolby Digital 5.1 Surround Sound | | Behind-The-Scenes Bonus Footage: Storyboards, Sets/Production Design, & Special FX | | Dubbed: French | | Featurettes: Special Delivery - Transporters In The Real World, & The Making Of Transporter 3 | | Includes A Digital Copy Of The Film For Portable Media Players! | | Interactive Menus | | Scene Selection | | Subtitles: English, Spanish | | This Is A Blu-Ray DVD Made For Blue-Laser Format Players Which Produce Higher Quality Picture & Sound |
| Technical Info
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Release Information
| | Studio: Lions Gate |
| Release Date: 3/10/2009 |
| Running Time: 104 minutes |
| Original Release Date: 2008 | | Catalog ID: 25094 | | UPC: 00031398107231 | | Number of Discs: 1 |
Audio & Video
| | Video: Color |
Aspect Ratio | | Widescreen 2.35:1 |
| Cast & Crew
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| | Professional Reviews | USA Today
"TRANSPORTER 3, like its predecessors, rides on the good looks and charisma of star Jason Statham....The stunts can be impressive, too." 11/25/2008Los Angeles Times
"[I]t's the charismatic unruffled dexterity in the face of impossible odds that rivets." 11/26/2008 Entertainment Weekly
"The third edition of the brassy global action franchise, featuring a hero who's finicky about rules of conduct, makes good on its formula with no pretensions." -- Grade: B 12/05/2008 p.53 ReelViews 6 of 10
The Transporter movies remind me of the Bond films of the '70s and '80s, in which each new installment tried to one-up its predecessor in terms of inventive and outrageous action set pieces. Without a doubt, Transporter 3 offers more innovative ways in which to defy the laws of physics than Transporter or Transporter 2, but it lacks more than a semblance of a coherent plot. And director Olivier Megaton (what a name for an action director?) has succumbed to the belief that an action scene isn't good if the viewer can figure out what's going on. Because of this, Transporter 3 is the most frustrating entry into a series that has never set the bar terribly high...Transporter 3 does not take place in this world. It transpires in a far-off land where cars can come to clean, skidding stops atop speeding trains and where those same cars can tilt on two wheels and zip in between tractor trailers. Moves like these are bold enough to make one smirk at their audacity - not even Bond at his cheesiest in his best Q-equipped vehicles would try something like this - but it's an empty amusement...One gets the feeling that the story was developed to accommodate the action set pieces, rather than the other way around. At best, the plot is irrelevant. At worst, it makes no sense...Transporter 3 is proof that brain-dead action movies can be found in theaters during Oscar season as well as during the summer. Fans of the first two Transporter films will likely find this one diverting, although it is a step in the wrong direction. Others will wonder how a movie this disjointed and poorly scripted could get made. I'm betting we haven't seen the last of Frank. He may have broken all of his prized "rules," but that's not enough to keep a good man down, especially in a series where gravity is a variable thing. - James Berardinelli
Chicago Sun-Times 7 of 10
"Transporter 3" is a perfectly acceptable brainless action thriller, inspiring us to give a lot of thought to complex sequences we would have been better off sucking on as eye candy. Consider this ingenious dilemma faced by the Transporter. He cannot remove a bracelet that is linked to a mighty bomb in his Audi A8. If he goes more than 75 feet from the car, the explosion kills him. He and the car and the Girl are trapped on a bridge by men with machineguns. He releases the Girl. The men are shooting at him. How can he escape?...The director of "Transporter 3," Olivier Megaton, is named after the bomb at Hiroshima, which was dropped on his birthday...Anyway, although Megaton's CGI fight scenes are as chopped up and incomprehensible as the current norm, he mostly avoids the Queasy-Cam and uses a stable camera while only the action moves. How about that...He also succeeds in clearing every highway in every chase scene so the road is held only by the chasers and the chasees. Except when two monster trucks are required to speed this way, in which case, although there has been no traffic since the border, they must pass each other and loudly toot their klaxons ooo-gaah! ooo-gaah! as if you don't see them...This movie is not boring. Jason Statham is a splendid action hero, steely-eyed, muscular, taciturn, a close-lipped know-it-all with three-day stubble. He could do the snowmobile race with two broken arms. The bad guys are suitably reprehensible, the photography is expert, and when you see the Transporter thinking his way out of that problem on the bottom of the lake, you're amazed that later he restarts the engine and uses it to drive onto the top of a speeding train and then calculates a way to use the train's speed to save ... but see for yourself. - Roger Ebert
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