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The search for the assassins leads Lee and Carter to an LA dojo, provoking surely the most pointless confrontation in Chan's Hollywood career, despite a towering opponent so outsized he looks like a Lord of the Rings camera trick rather than a real person (he isn't; Chinese basketball player Sun Ming Ming of the Maryland Nighthawks really is 7'9"). There's also a "Who's on first?" sequence involving dojo master Yu (as in "I am Yu"). I cannot resist quoting the production notes: Producer Jonathan Glickman says: "They are virtually doing an Abbott and Costello routine … It has no place in any type of action movie you've seen before, but in Rush Hour, it's perfect." Yes. That is why they used the exact same joke in Rush Hour 2 ("You died!" "Inspector Yu died?!").

There is one well-imagined gag in which Lee and Carter, having captured an Asian assassin who only speaks French, are obliged to enlist the assistance of an older nun who speaks French so that they can interrogate him. The defiant thug spits vulgarities that the nun demurely conveys through euphemisms ("He used the n-word again"), prompting a furious Carter to respond in kind—but at Lee's insistence, out of respect for the nun's vocation, Carter must also restrict himself to euphemisms. Even a tired nun-speaking-slang joke at the end doesn't entirely ruin the scene.

A rude welcome from Dragon Lady (Youki Kudoh)

The trail then leads to Paris, a setting which the production notes mention provided inspiration for new possibilities for costuming fabrics. It also opens the door to new possibilities for lack of costuming fabrics. "Did you know the average French woman is naked 34 percent of the time?!" Carter asks on the flight, his nose in whatever sort of reading material contains such tidbits of information.

In Rush Hour 2, sequences in a Las Vegas casino and a Hong Kong massage parlor offered plenty of opportunity for gratuitous ogling of barely-clad showgirls and masseuses, but now we're in Paris, where they can have actual topless showgirls if they want to (they want to). Rush Hour 3 is also the first Rush Hour in which Carter actually gets a woman in bed, although she doesn't get a chance to get out of her skivvies. Chan used to have a scruple about sex scenes in movies, because he wanted his films to be family-friendly. Oh well.

And so it goes, until the climactic confrontation at the Eiffel Tower, which contains what is surely the best extended sequence in Chan's Hollywood oeuvre. Happily, after two directorial misfires in which practically every action sequence in the first two films is marred by pointless close-ups and quick cuts, returning director Brett Rattner seems at last to have learned his lesson, and gives Chan room and time to do what he does best. (Perhaps Rattner learned a thing or two making X-Men 3, as disappointing as it was.) The climax involves a sword fight much more satisfying than the one in Shanghai Knights, some inspired derring-do in and on the Eiffel Tower, and a climactic stunt that outdoes the big finales of both earlier films.

In the final shot, as Chan and Tucker yet again boogie to the strains of Edwin Starr's War ("Huh! What is it good for? Absolutely nothing!"), you might be momentarily struck by the ironic incongruity of a film that practically celebrates America's violent image abroad having an anti-war anthem as its hallmark. At that point you should slap yourself in the head for thinking too hard, and sit back for the outtakes.

Talk About It

1. Have you ever let old friends or family members get away with behavior that you would never accept from someone else, such as a coworker or a recent acquaintance?
2. Should we treat people differently based on their history with us? Can giving loved ones slack to misbehave ever be a form of loyalty or love? Can it be a form of weakness or enabling? How can we tell the difference?

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