By Samantha Ofole-Prince
Jason Statham, who burst onto the scene in 2002’s “The Transporter,” is back as Frank Martin, an ex-Special Force operative with a decidedly cool demeanor who makes a living delivering anything, anywhere with no questions asked. The location has changed from Europe to Miami, and this time he is “doing a favor for a friend” and playing driver to a 7 year old child (Hunter Clary), son of the wealthy businessman, Ted Billings (Matthew Modine). When the boy is kidnapped, Frank makes it a priority to find the child, hunt down the killers and bring them to justice.
“T2” has no twists nor turns and very simply copies the formula that worked the first time except this time it suffers from extraneous over plotting, and features plenty of unintentional humor with its over-the top animation and over-choreographed fight scenes (Statham literally dodges bullets). In one astonishing scene, Frank defeats a gang of four thugs who tried to car jack him with a fire hose, and in another he detaches a bomb from the bottom of his moving Audi whilst in mid air, then defies gravity by narrowly missing a car accident – jumps and stays mid air whilst the cars collide. The villains, Columbian Gianni (Alessandro Gassman) and his sidekick Lola (Katie Nauta) who walks around the middle of downtown Miami in sexy lacy Lingerie and a pair of cherry red, stiletto pumps, touting and shooting two machine guns is laughable in her attempt at being a sexy psycho.
“Rules are made to be broken” – that’s the tagline of this half-baked movie, which breaks every rule book in gravity and believability with its over exaggerated special effects and ridiculous stunts. Whilst it contains enough adrenaline ridden stunts to quench any raucous appetite, and Statham plays his role with the right amount of cool and irony, it is downright disappointing in contrast to the prequel. “T2” is an unwarranted sequel to the modest-grossing “The Transporter.”
