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Jason Statham will ride this and Crank to the bitter end

Kim Hollis: The Transporter 3 earned $18.2 million over five days. Is this more, less or about what you expected from this project?

Brandon Scott: Yes. Though on a personal note, I ran into (kinda sorta, read: he was stalking me) Jason Statham a few months back here in LA and I can tell you he is not environmentally conscious. He drives a V-12 Audi of some sort and I can't help but think he would have been better off car-pooling for the benefit of our children. They are our future. Teach them well and let them lead the way. Show them all the beauty they possess inside. Give them a sense...of pride. Sexual Chocolate.

Pete Kilmer: I think so. Jason Statham has become one of my favorite action guys in the last few years. After seeing him in The Bank Job, which he is terrific in, he's now become one of the guys who I really want to see push their acting skills. My hope is that he can balance the action films with movies of the quality of The Bank Job. And I totally endorse him as the future Matt Murdock aka Daredevil when they relaunch that movie series.

Scott Lumley: That's a surprisingly good result for what is really the third go around for a fairly mindless action series. I had this pegged at $10 million for the weekend with fair to middling legs finishing out at about $38 million total. The Budget for Transporter 2 was about $32 million. If this is a similar budget then this is a fantastically profitable movie in short order. And in regards to Statham, I can't buy into him as Daredevil. But if there's a more perfect casting than Statham as Bullseye, I haven't thought of it.

Max Braden: Hitman opened to $21 million this weekend last year. I'd expect Statham to perform a little better except that there's nothing memorable about this series than some kick ass fighting.

Reagen Sulewski: Certainly less considering how well Transporter 2 did, but I can't for the life of me figure out why they opened this one with a Bond film in the marketplace.





Shane Jenkins: Reagen, I was thinking the same thing. I think they left money on the table by opening this in such a crowded and competitive period. Why not save it for January, when the only things competing for our attention are Leprechaun direct-to-video sequels and seasonal depression?

David Mumpower: As Reagen said, it's a step back from The Transporter 2, which did $16.5 million in three days. The third outing has barely matched that in five. Of course, Lionsgate acquired domestic rights to this project on the cheap, so this transaction borders on arbitrage for them.

Jason Lee: I agree with what's been said so far. While this a solid opening for a moderate franchise in its third outing, it baffles me as to why Lionsgate would release this in the holiday timeframe. They absolutely robbed themselves of having any chance to play top dog.

Jamie Ruccio: Having not taken a look at any of the numbers save for what's been mentioned here I agree that it's on the underside of average for his box office track record.

That being said, I hope it does well. I don't know why (mancrush?) but I enjoy his movies. I'm with Pete, he's my favorite action guy out there. Between his earlier films, the criminally under-appreciated Lock, Stock and Two Smoking Barrels, the supremely criminally under appreciated Snatch, the Transporter Series and the polarizing Crank, he is the only action star out there that I care to watch right now.

And for what it's worth I agree with Reagen. The people who scheduled this against the recently opened Bond are probably the same people who scheduled Bolt up against Twilight. Unless there are circumstances that I'm not aware of there has been some pretty wonky scheduling as of late.

David Mumpower: For a while now, I've considered him the new Jean Claude Van Damme. Nobody remembers it now, but there was a period of time where that waste of space consistently found success in low budget action films. They made enough in theaters to justify their production cost then they cleaned up on home video. Statham has become that guy in the 2000s. It's not glamorous, but Statham has an asset Van Damme never did. He can still prestige work in roles like The Bank Job as well because when all else fails, he can act.

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