Back in November, New Line teased us by whispering in our ear the tantalizing news that it had secured the services of the entire Rush Hour team for the franchise's third installment, providing celebrated fauxteur Brett Ratner with all the tools necessary to fully exploit his hacky gifts. (For example, had Tucker not signed on, Ratner would've been forced to replace him with a stand-in pinching the air out of a balloon, a crude substitute for the actor's trademark high-pitched whine that would've severely hamstrung his cinematic vision.) With the director's support system all in place, Variety reports that New Line has finally greenlighted the Paris-set pic, which will start production late this summer for a release in the summer of 2007. We know that movie magic takes time to properly conjure, but a year seems like an unspeakably cruel amount of time to have to wait to see Tucker and Jackie Chan engaged in a hilarious, language-barrier-hampered argument with a stereotypically rude French waiter, in which none of three agitated parties has any idea why a Chinese gang has decided to terrorize the French capital.

• New Line will rush 'Hour 3' [Variety]
• "Rush Hour" Dream Team Reassembled For Inevitable Sequel [Defamer]

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