There’s all manner of odd little film subgenres out there but the splinters don’t come any odder than geezer fu – that weird conflation of the British balls-to-the-wall gangster flick and the rap fu movie – itself a bizarre post-Blaxploitation collision of Hong Kong heroic bloodshed and hip-hop. Work with me here.
As with any, erm, respectable subgenre, there are certain rules and regulations with the geezer fu film. It has to be flashy. Think the Armani suited testosterone rush of The Transporter. It also has to be really culturally bizarre. Parts of Revolver fit the bill, as does the entirety of Unleashed, which offered the discombobulating spectacle of Morgan Freeman, his white daughter and his adopted mute Chinese son taking refuge in a Glaswegian Spar shop from Bob Hoskins and his Cockney henchmen. Most importantly – and this can’t be stressed loudly enough – there has to martial arts and there have to be geezers.
This sequel to The Transporter, Luc Besson’s empty-calorie post-Matrix shoot-em-up, fits the bill perfectly. Though Besson has passed on directorial duties this time out, Transporter 2 has his fingerprints all over. The cars are fast, the hero is video-game superhuman and the women are slutty. Indeed, everything right down to the shoes gets fetished in this splendidly trashy affair which sees Jason Statham’s unflappable driver embroiled in some nonsense about a child kidnapping. Mostly, it’s an excuse for martial arts with axes, car chases, more car chases and increasingly preposterous plot developments. There’s a bomb under the Audi! There’s a virus about to infect the entire city! If only I had a jet-ski I could catch that speeding bus!
To which we say – Ludicrous! Frenetic! Camp! Still, The Transporter 2 has the wit to be camp on purpose and as a shallow as a spoken word gig with Paris Hilton. Unless teenage boys have suddenly gotten all respectable this ought to please them like nothing since Baywatch. For no-brainer pizzazz look no further.