A mouthy and feisty taxicab driver has hot tips for a green and inept cop set on solving a string of New York City bank robberies committed by a quartet of female Brazilian bank robbers. Belle Williams is a speed demon. Flying through the streets of New York in her tricked-out taxi, she's earned a rep as New York's fastest cabbie. But driving a hack is only a pit stop for her real dream: Belle wants to be a race car champion. And she's well on her way–until she's derailed by overeager cop Andy Washburn, whose undercover skills are matched only by his total ineptitude behind the wheel. Washburn, whose lack of vehicular skills has landed him in the precinct doghouse, is hot on the heels of a gang of beautiful Brazilian bank robbers, led by Vanessa, their cold, calculating–and leggy–leader. To nab the evasive crooks, drivers license-less Washburn convinces Belle to team up with him to pursue Vanessa and crew. Belle has carte blanche to drive at any speed and break any law. The car-less cop and speed-demon cabbie–New York's unlikeliest partners– begin a high-speed game of cat and mouse with the robbers. That is, if Belle and Washburn don't end up killing each other first. Just saw this film at the sneak preview and was heavily disappointed. It misses everything the original had: flair, fun and exciting car races. Instead there is Jimmy Fallon. Who the heck is Jimmy Fallon? This guy is totally unfunny and can not act. Whenever he appeared I was clenching my teeth. Queen Latifah was okay but the relationship between her and Fallon's character was… not existent. The four gangster ladies are nice to look at but totally miscast. Even for a film like this it is laughable to think of them as bank robbers or villains. And the mother… ARGH! My suggestion: see the original! It IS funny, has actors who can act, the wonderful Marion Cotillard, car races in Marseilles and (the always popular) evil Germans ;) 3/10 I actually saw this movie on a trans-Pacific flight - first thing I thought, when it came on, was that it merely had the same name as the French Taxi movies I love so much. Next, when I saw the opening sequence was nearly identical, I started to get worried that the original had been remade and destroyed by Hollywood. I was right!<br/><br/>If you watch this movie without prior knowledge of the French Taxi movies, you may or may not like it. It's a fresh idea and a fun movie. The acting wasn't great, but at least non-serious roles like this don't require top-grade acting. What made this movie horrible, though, is that it just didn't measure up to the originals (Taxi and Taxi 2). Even though I don't understand French, and my Taxi DVDs do not have subtitles, I still thoroughly enjoy them, as they are packed full of exciting car chases and slapstick humour. They are both incredibly tightly-packaged movies - they never lose my attention. The remake had several completely unnecessary scenes inserted, was full of bad jokes, and to top it off, had far less interesting cars.<br/><br/>Though this movie is useful in helping you understand the Taxi story (if you don't understand French), I must urge anyone to watch the originals as well/instead! Queen Latifah is a natural-born charmer, but there's only so much she can do when paired with a costar so irritating it's hard not to squirm when he's on the screen, which is most of the time.
Egmonwen replied
296 weeks ago