Taxi 2 is the 2000 sequel to 1998's French answer to many-an American buddy films filtered by way for car enthusiasts, which was simply entitled 'Taxi'. While it's fair to say I barely liked either, Taxi 2 didn't frustrate; annoy nor bore me as much as the first film did, in fact at times it was pleasant to see it venture down the routes it did purely because it meant refraining from doing what it did so badly in the first film. Although Taxi 2 certainly sees a similar set up for the first one. Rough-and-ready cabbie Daniel (Naceri) is called upon to help out fumbling and bumbling police officer Émilien (Diefenthal) in taking down some criminals for sake of global relations between nations France and Japan. Some annoying things are retained from Taxi, others were banished; some new problems came about, others didn't bother me so much. On the whole, it's 88 minutes of some rather cynical entertainment that's stupid enough to work if you excuse the odd thing; but this is probably the highest amount of praise you can give to it.
Taxi 2's been moved to French capital Paris from the sunny, southern city of Marseille; I'm thinking because the first was such an unexpected hit and most international audiences have been deemed too stupid to know what or where Marseille is, thus shifting it to somewhere French they have heard of is the easiest way to give them a sense of familiarity. The jump is a shifting of which is so senile, that the arrival by way of parachute into said city goes so far as to encompass the Eiffel Tower planted within the composition. The film begins with Daniel and his taxi, a suped-up Peugeot, winning a rally race without meaning to. He's speeding, and it's all made to look like a lot of fun; but where the first encouraged reckless driving and fetishised automobiles in a way that was positively ridiculous, Taxi 2 pokes fun at these criticisms by having him in the process of rushing a woman to a hospital as she's about to give birth. His urgent driving suddenly given a sense of justification and there feels a meek reason to it; whereas in the first, it was breaking speed limits and traffic codes under a sickly banner of the 'fun' and of the comedic. Daniel's girlfriend is Lilly (Cotillard), and he wants her to be his wife; but this is something he has to get past her father, a general, and a real strict case. Eventually, the film will branch out into a daft process of Daniel proving himself to this individual as he undertakes the given quest.
The first Taxi film's inclusion of the odd relationship between French state and French civilian remains in this sequel, captured resolutely in a scene that sees a top ranked French state official attempt to don hero of the hour Daniel with a suit, but it's too small and Daniel's build tears through it - his blue French football jersey piercing through the fabric in what is an attempt at all encompassing, all consuming state formality being torn through and therefore foiled by working class, knock-about French youth in the Zidane labelled football kit. His buddy Émilien is still a loser, and the police are still generally incompetent; Émilien finally passes his driving test out of his instructor's pity and then gets beaten up by his crush Petra (Wiklund) in a karate class. Overseeing most of the film's events is the xenophobic as-ever police Commissaire named Gibert (Farcy), a somewhat disgraceful customer whose chief source of humour revolved around nationalism and racism in the first and continues the trend here; the film going so far as to encompass a racial slur towards the Japanese which casually switches off a voice-responsive car, something Gibert blurts out with much glee every time the time comes to utter it.
The loose, loose plot sees the Japanese minister of defence visit France but then kidnapped by some gangsters; it was Germans in the first film, now it's the Japanese Yakuza, whom aren't cackling Aryan's like the Germans were but are black leather jacket and shades sporting nasties whom do not smile. Also, because it's all linked to the Far East 'n' all, the film goes so far as to incorporate daft kung-fu sequences purely there out of the fact the Japanese are the enemy. All this allows Daniel to, as mentioned, prove himself to his father-in-law-to-be General and the everyman to bail the state out of trouble once again.
What I liked was that the car chases do not exist in the writer's mind to purvey a negative sense, rather they were encompassed righteously for positive reasons instead of 'crazy driving is funny/good'. Petra and Émilien's relationship sees her match him and adopt a stronger role this time round, rather than have her merely exist so as to be ogled at by the aforementioned inept cop. Additionally, action is not as key in this addition and the cars are not given as much of a focus as they were in the first; when eerie fetishisations of the things were given more due attention. Taxi 2 is pretty infantile, but there was something consistently interesting on a very basic level in the two leads doing everything they do out of love for respective people; the speedy car sequences servicing a point rather than just having them there for sake of it and that sense of something at stake feeling more prominent this time around. This, while the basic sense of nationalistic pride, in the commissioner's character, being punished and put through a series of humiliations for possessing these beliefs, when his entire operation is sabotaged by those he deems unworthy; inferior and below him ie; the Japanese. Taxi 2 won't be for everyone; as it was, I found it just about interesting enough.
Taxi 2's been moved to French capital Paris from the sunny, southern city of Marseille; I'm thinking because the first was such an unexpected hit and most international audiences have been deemed too stupid to know what or where Marseille is, thus shifting it to somewhere French they have heard of is the easiest way to give them a sense of familiarity. The jump is a shifting of which is so senile, that the arrival by way of parachute into said city goes so far as to encompass the Eiffel Tower planted within the composition. The film begins with Daniel and his taxi, a suped-up Peugeot, winning a rally race without meaning to. He's speeding, and it's all made to look like a lot of fun; but where the first encouraged reckless driving and fetishised automobiles in a way that was positively ridiculous, Taxi 2 pokes fun at these criticisms by having him in the process of rushing a woman to a hospital as she's about to give birth. His urgent driving suddenly given a sense of justification and there feels a meek reason to it; whereas in the first, it was breaking speed limits and traffic codes under a sickly banner of the 'fun' and of the comedic. Daniel's girlfriend is Lilly (Cotillard), and he wants her to be his wife; but this is something he has to get past her father, a general, and a real strict case. Eventually, the film will branch out into a daft process of Daniel proving himself to this individual as he undertakes the given quest.
The first Taxi film's inclusion of the odd relationship between French state and French civilian remains in this sequel, captured resolutely in a scene that sees a top ranked French state official attempt to don hero of the hour Daniel with a suit, but it's too small and Daniel's build tears through it - his blue French football jersey piercing through the fabric in what is an attempt at all encompassing, all consuming state formality being torn through and therefore foiled by working class, knock-about French youth in the Zidane labelled football kit. His buddy Émilien is still a loser, and the police are still generally incompetent; Émilien finally passes his driving test out of his instructor's pity and then gets beaten up by his crush Petra (Wiklund) in a karate class. Overseeing most of the film's events is the xenophobic as-ever police Commissaire named Gibert (Farcy), a somewhat disgraceful customer whose chief source of humour revolved around nationalism and racism in the first and continues the trend here; the film going so far as to encompass a racial slur towards the Japanese which casually switches off a voice-responsive car, something Gibert blurts out with much glee every time the time comes to utter it.
The loose, loose plot sees the Japanese minister of defence visit France but then kidnapped by some gangsters; it was Germans in the first film, now it's the Japanese Yakuza, whom aren't cackling Aryan's like the Germans were but are black leather jacket and shades sporting nasties whom do not smile. Also, because it's all linked to the Far East 'n' all, the film goes so far as to incorporate daft kung-fu sequences purely there out of the fact the Japanese are the enemy. All this allows Daniel to, as mentioned, prove himself to his father-in-law-to-be General and the everyman to bail the state out of trouble once again.
What I liked was that the car chases do not exist in the writer's mind to purvey a negative sense, rather they were encompassed righteously for positive reasons instead of 'crazy driving is funny/good'. Petra and Émilien's relationship sees her match him and adopt a stronger role this time round, rather than have her merely exist so as to be ogled at by the aforementioned inept cop. Additionally, action is not as key in this addition and the cars are not given as much of a focus as they were in the first; when eerie fetishisations of the things were given more due attention. Taxi 2 is pretty infantile, but there was something consistently interesting on a very basic level in the two leads doing everything they do out of love for respective people; the speedy car sequences servicing a point rather than just having them there for sake of it and that sense of something at stake feeling more prominent this time around. This, while the basic sense of nationalistic pride, in the commissioner's character, being punished and put through a series of humiliations for possessing these beliefs, when his entire operation is sabotaged by those he deems unworthy; inferior and below him ie; the Japanese. Taxi 2 won't be for everyone; as it was, I found it just about interesting enough.