REVIEWED - THE TRANSPORTER 2Here's a comedy standard I haven't seen for some time. After watching Jason Statham persuade his Audi to sail 500 metres through the air, perform several graceful pirouettes, then land gently on its unscuffed tires, a tramp rubs his eyes in disbelief and glowers accusingly at his half-drunk bottle of hooch.
I know exactly how he feels. The events in this gloriously absurd sequel to an equally enjoyable 2002 martial arts flick are so psychedelically unlikely that you fast jump to the conclusion that somebody - you, the director, God - has been drinking something stronger than gasoline.
Earlier this year Louis Leterrier, a protege of the perennially vulgar Luc Besson, brought us the even more deranged Unleashed. That Jet Li vehicle was, however, a little too grim and earnest to qualify as harmless good fun. The Transporter 2, by contrast, is a nonstop carnival of testosterone-charged mayhem: semi-nude women with machine guns, mutated killer viruses, acrobatics which rewrite all known laws of physics.
Though the film has a plot - Statham, driver to the wealthy, has to rescue the kidnapped son of a drugs enforcement official - it is better summed up by making reference to the excellent TV trailer in which the hero creatively annihilates several villains with a fire-hose.
If you think such things are not worth doing, even if done as well as they can be done, then The Transporter 2 may not be to your taste. But if you feel as I do and this sort of exchange is the closest thing to ballet you can watch without feeling drowsy, then you should have an absolute ball.
