A phone booth hasn't gotten this much attention since "Superman."
From filmmaker Joel Schumacher, who directed Colin Farrell in "Tigerland" (2000) and Kiefer Sutherland in "The Lost Boys" (1987) and "Flatliners" (1990), comes this 2002 thriller starring Farrell and Sutherland about a sniper who pins a guy down in a phone booth. It sounds preposterous to sustain for the duration of a feature-length film, you say? Think again. "Phone Booth" may be imperfect, its biggest flaws being two unsympathetic main characters and a contrived and far-fetched plot, but that doesn't stop the audience from having a heck of a good time most of the way. It's quite an accomplishment, really, when you consider that Farrell is on screen almost 100% of the time and Sutherland is a disembodied voice.
I didn't have nearly the good time that you did, John, and neither did my wife, who found this film so annoying that she had to leave the room. Though Farrell doesn't hold my interest in the same way that Tom Hanks did in "Cast Away," I didn't mind him being on screen for almost every frame, despite his slipping into two or three different accents during that time. It's the disembodied voice, which sounded more like Kelsey Grammer than Sutherland, that was incredibly annoying. But the B-movie plot, I'll grant you, created and sustained a credible tension.
We're told at the beginning of the movie that despite practically everyone in the greater New York metropolitan area owning a telephone, approximately 4,500,000 people still use phone booths on a regular basis. One of these people is publicist Stu Shepard, a married man who daily uses the last remaining old-fashioned phone booth in the city for calls to his girlfriend, Pam (Katie Holmes). He calls at same time every day from a place he feels his wife (Radha Mitchell) will never find evidence on the phone bills. It's a booth in busy, downtown Manhattan, about to be retired and replaced by a ubiquitous telephone kiosk. But today it's all Stu's, his privacy secure. That is, until a sniper targets him for his personal amusement.
High above the phone booth, hidden in one of a thousand windows, is a madman with a high-powered rifle and a telescopic lens, a man who knows Stu's every move and has rigged up the booth with all manner of gizmos to get and keep Stu's attention. He's never met Stu, but he's researched him and hates what he represents: a fast-talking schemer, a conceited ladies' man, and an unfaithful husband. It's enough for the sniper to call Stu at the booth and then keep him there with the promise of a bullet through his head if he dares leave. If Stu hangs up or steps out of the booth, it's good-bye, Stu. Those few square feet suddenly become for the duration of the movie Stu's whole world, his whole life.
Does the killer mean what he says? "Stu," the sniper tells him, "I never kid." And then he blows away a pimp who's come to claim the phone booth for one of his girls. The police arrive, finding Stu in the booth and the dead body outside, and assume Stu is a murderer.
That's the whole situation in a nutshell, set up in the first few minutes of the picture and continuing for the remainder of the film. The sniper is a self-appointed vigilante who finds Stu guilty of "inhumanity" to his fellow man. Forest Whitaker plays a policeman, Captain Ramey, who has to figure out what's going on and what to do. Before long, Stu's become famous, because not only does half the NYC blue show up but so do the television cameras. Yet Stu can't explain why he won't leave the booth or what's happening to him, lest the unknown, unseen sniper put a bullet through him.
The situation is tense, scary, and gripping throughout, even if the whole affair is too incredible to believe. It's to the film's credit, however, that it doesn't give one enough time to consider the logic until it's over, by which time you don't care because it's been so entertaining.
Yeah, let's talk about the logic. I frankly had a hard time with the basic assumption: that a guy who uses a pay phone to call a would-be lover so his wife won't be able to see the number on his cell phone wouldn't just walk away from a voice like that. Hang up. Answering the phone might be a compulsion, but who keeps listening and gives a smarmy-voiced guy a chance to even set his plan in motion? And I found the "cleansing" vigilante a tiresome cliché. We've seen these guys kill prostitutes, bash gays, and threaten whole planets. It's so familiar that you can't help but turn your attention to other things . . . or be annoyed by the constant droning of that disembodied voice, which gets to be more tedious than your worst phone solicitor nightmare. We won't even talk about how predictable that O. Henry trick ending was.
I did have a few quibbles, though, that nagged me during and after the picture. Most important, was it really necessary to make both leads so repellant? It goes without saying that the sniper is a lunatic, a serial killer who's done this kind of thing before; we're not supposed to have any heart for him. He is virtually never seen, and Sutherland projects in his voice exactly the right degree of slimy menace to make him totally repulsive. Indeed, it is Sutherland who practically steals the show, he's so mesmerizing, a little like the old-time "Shadow."
But Farrell's character is almost equally offensive. Stu is the kind of guy who gives PR a bad name: a lying, cheating, conniving, self-centered young jerk without a care in the world for anybody but himself. Frankly, for most of the picture, we don't feel enough for him to care whether he lives or dies. Indeed, I'd be willing to bet that a lot of folks in the audience would like to see him blown away regardless. Worse, there's a reason for Stu's being such a total creep, and when it's revealed, it's almost as bad as our not knowing.
I also had issues with the movie's ending; with the police captain's extraneous problems with a department negotiator; with the director's over-reliance on split screens and multi-angles; and with the fact that the plot runs out of steam about two-thirds of the way through, making the film probably too long even for its brief eighty-one minutes. Still, it's a good time while it lasts.
I'll grant that what began as a stylish opening--a kind of New York medley of cell phone use, with the people Farrell talks to appearing in a small rectangular pop-up screen--turned into an overly familiar device that, by the story's end, felt gimmicky. I also felt that the whole idea of this guy taking his ring off while talking to a would-be lover in a phone booth was just a little strained, and I objected to the way the script deteriorated, near the end, to a kind of cheesy version of "Sophie's Choice."
The story is the brainchild of writer Larry Cohen, hitherto known for B-movie and schlock horror flicks like "Maniac Cop" and "It's Alive." With "Phone Booth," however, Cohen is right on target and hits the mark, if you'll excuse the expression. It's still B-movie material, mind you, but it's good B-movie material, elevating the substance of this film well beyond anything we have had any right to expect from the genre.
At least we agree on one thing. This is a B-movie, for sure. And it relies on melodrama way too much for me to think of it as anything but a wrong number.
Video:
The 1080p HD picture (2.35:1 aspect ration, transferred to a 25GB disc using MPEG-2 technology at 26MBPS) looks great, with all kinds of sharp detail, even on fast-walking pedestrians where different colors might have caused a slight blurring. There isn't as much color saturation as you'd normally see, but much of that is undoubtedly the result of atmospheric conditions. The film was shot mostly outdoors in natural light, and in a phone booth with existing light.
Audio:
"Phone Booth" has a vibrant soundtrack, with the featured option English DTS HD 5.1 Master Lossless Audio and additional options in Spanish and French Dolby Digital 5.1 Surround. Subtitles are in English and Spanish. You have to give credit to the audio technicians, because they managed to convey the full sense of metropolitan street noise while also maintaining control over the sound.
Extras:
Schumacher provides a low-key director's commentary in which he doesn't seem to notice any of the film's flaws. Other than that, there's only a theatrical trailer in Hi Def.
Parting Thoughts/Bottom Line:
"Phone Booth" is, without a doubt, little more than an amusement-park joy ride, but what an enjoyable ride it is! With the sure hand of a capable director and the exceptionally fine performances of its three principal actors, the film is one of the edgiest, most exciting dramas to come along in a while. In short, "Phone Booth" is a great call.
Great call, or wrong number? For me, it came closer to an annoying phone solicitor who talks in a quasi-seductive voice while trying to mask his heavy breathing. Farrell does a good job with his role, and Forest Whitaker does more with his 15 minutes of "Phone Booth" fame than either Katie Holmes or Radha Mitchell. The director was, indeed, capable, though he went a little overboard with the camera effects. It's the script and the cheesy melodrama that bring the film down. There's tension, sure, but a most familiar and predictable variety.
From filmmaker Joel Schumacher, who directed Colin Farrell in "Tigerland" (2000) and Kiefer Sutherland in "The Lost Boys" (1987) and "Flatliners" (1990), comes this 2002 thriller starring Farrell and Sutherland about a sniper who pins a guy down in a phone booth. It sounds preposterous to sustain for the duration of a feature-length film, you say? Think again. "Phone Booth" may be imperfect, its biggest flaws being two unsympathetic main characters and a contrived and far-fetched plot, but that doesn't stop the audience from having a heck of a good time most of the way. It's quite an accomplishment, really, when you consider that Farrell is on screen almost 100% of the time and Sutherland is a disembodied voice.
I didn't have nearly the good time that you did, John, and neither did my wife, who found this film so annoying that she had to leave the room. Though Farrell doesn't hold my interest in the same way that Tom Hanks did in "Cast Away," I didn't mind him being on screen for almost every frame, despite his slipping into two or three different accents during that time. It's the disembodied voice, which sounded more like Kelsey Grammer than Sutherland, that was incredibly annoying. But the B-movie plot, I'll grant you, created and sustained a credible tension.
We're told at the beginning of the movie that despite practically everyone in the greater New York metropolitan area owning a telephone, approximately 4,500,000 people still use phone booths on a regular basis. One of these people is publicist Stu Shepard, a married man who daily uses the last remaining old-fashioned phone booth in the city for calls to his girlfriend, Pam (Katie Holmes). He calls at same time every day from a place he feels his wife (Radha Mitchell) will never find evidence on the phone bills. It's a booth in busy, downtown Manhattan, about to be retired and replaced by a ubiquitous telephone kiosk. But today it's all Stu's, his privacy secure. That is, until a sniper targets him for his personal amusement.
High above the phone booth, hidden in one of a thousand windows, is a madman with a high-powered rifle and a telescopic lens, a man who knows Stu's every move and has rigged up the booth with all manner of gizmos to get and keep Stu's attention. He's never met Stu, but he's researched him and hates what he represents: a fast-talking schemer, a conceited ladies' man, and an unfaithful husband. It's enough for the sniper to call Stu at the booth and then keep him there with the promise of a bullet through his head if he dares leave. If Stu hangs up or steps out of the booth, it's good-bye, Stu. Those few square feet suddenly become for the duration of the movie Stu's whole world, his whole life.
Does the killer mean what he says? "Stu," the sniper tells him, "I never kid." And then he blows away a pimp who's come to claim the phone booth for one of his girls. The police arrive, finding Stu in the booth and the dead body outside, and assume Stu is a murderer.
That's the whole situation in a nutshell, set up in the first few minutes of the picture and continuing for the remainder of the film. The sniper is a self-appointed vigilante who finds Stu guilty of "inhumanity" to his fellow man. Forest Whitaker plays a policeman, Captain Ramey, who has to figure out what's going on and what to do. Before long, Stu's become famous, because not only does half the NYC blue show up but so do the television cameras. Yet Stu can't explain why he won't leave the booth or what's happening to him, lest the unknown, unseen sniper put a bullet through him.
The situation is tense, scary, and gripping throughout, even if the whole affair is too incredible to believe. It's to the film's credit, however, that it doesn't give one enough time to consider the logic until it's over, by which time you don't care because it's been so entertaining.
Yeah, let's talk about the logic. I frankly had a hard time with the basic assumption: that a guy who uses a pay phone to call a would-be lover so his wife won't be able to see the number on his cell phone wouldn't just walk away from a voice like that. Hang up. Answering the phone might be a compulsion, but who keeps listening and gives a smarmy-voiced guy a chance to even set his plan in motion? And I found the "cleansing" vigilante a tiresome cliché. We've seen these guys kill prostitutes, bash gays, and threaten whole planets. It's so familiar that you can't help but turn your attention to other things . . . or be annoyed by the constant droning of that disembodied voice, which gets to be more tedious than your worst phone solicitor nightmare. We won't even talk about how predictable that O. Henry trick ending was.
I did have a few quibbles, though, that nagged me during and after the picture. Most important, was it really necessary to make both leads so repellant? It goes without saying that the sniper is a lunatic, a serial killer who's done this kind of thing before; we're not supposed to have any heart for him. He is virtually never seen, and Sutherland projects in his voice exactly the right degree of slimy menace to make him totally repulsive. Indeed, it is Sutherland who practically steals the show, he's so mesmerizing, a little like the old-time "Shadow."
But Farrell's character is almost equally offensive. Stu is the kind of guy who gives PR a bad name: a lying, cheating, conniving, self-centered young jerk without a care in the world for anybody but himself. Frankly, for most of the picture, we don't feel enough for him to care whether he lives or dies. Indeed, I'd be willing to bet that a lot of folks in the audience would like to see him blown away regardless. Worse, there's a reason for Stu's being such a total creep, and when it's revealed, it's almost as bad as our not knowing.
I also had issues with the movie's ending; with the police captain's extraneous problems with a department negotiator; with the director's over-reliance on split screens and multi-angles; and with the fact that the plot runs out of steam about two-thirds of the way through, making the film probably too long even for its brief eighty-one minutes. Still, it's a good time while it lasts.
I'll grant that what began as a stylish opening--a kind of New York medley of cell phone use, with the people Farrell talks to appearing in a small rectangular pop-up screen--turned into an overly familiar device that, by the story's end, felt gimmicky. I also felt that the whole idea of this guy taking his ring off while talking to a would-be lover in a phone booth was just a little strained, and I objected to the way the script deteriorated, near the end, to a kind of cheesy version of "Sophie's Choice."
The story is the brainchild of writer Larry Cohen, hitherto known for B-movie and schlock horror flicks like "Maniac Cop" and "It's Alive." With "Phone Booth," however, Cohen is right on target and hits the mark, if you'll excuse the expression. It's still B-movie material, mind you, but it's good B-movie material, elevating the substance of this film well beyond anything we have had any right to expect from the genre.
At least we agree on one thing. This is a B-movie, for sure. And it relies on melodrama way too much for me to think of it as anything but a wrong number.
Video:
The 1080p HD picture (2.35:1 aspect ration, transferred to a 25GB disc using MPEG-2 technology at 26MBPS) looks great, with all kinds of sharp detail, even on fast-walking pedestrians where different colors might have caused a slight blurring. There isn't as much color saturation as you'd normally see, but much of that is undoubtedly the result of atmospheric conditions. The film was shot mostly outdoors in natural light, and in a phone booth with existing light.
Audio:
"Phone Booth" has a vibrant soundtrack, with the featured option English DTS HD 5.1 Master Lossless Audio and additional options in Spanish and French Dolby Digital 5.1 Surround. Subtitles are in English and Spanish. You have to give credit to the audio technicians, because they managed to convey the full sense of metropolitan street noise while also maintaining control over the sound.
Extras:
Schumacher provides a low-key director's commentary in which he doesn't seem to notice any of the film's flaws. Other than that, there's only a theatrical trailer in Hi Def.
Parting Thoughts/Bottom Line:
"Phone Booth" is, without a doubt, little more than an amusement-park joy ride, but what an enjoyable ride it is! With the sure hand of a capable director and the exceptionally fine performances of its three principal actors, the film is one of the edgiest, most exciting dramas to come along in a while. In short, "Phone Booth" is a great call.
Great call, or wrong number? For me, it came closer to an annoying phone solicitor who talks in a quasi-seductive voice while trying to mask his heavy breathing. Farrell does a good job with his role, and Forest Whitaker does more with his 15 minutes of "Phone Booth" fame than either Katie Holmes or Radha Mitchell. The director was, indeed, capable, though he went a little overboard with the camera effects. It's the script and the cheesy melodrama that bring the film down. There's tension, sure, but a most familiar and predictable variety.
A phone booth hasn't gotten this much attention since "Superman."
From filmmaker Joel Schumacher, who directed Colin Farrell in "Tigerland" (2000) and Kiefer Sutherland in "The Lost Boys" (1987) and "Flatliners" (1990), comes this 2002 thriller starring Farrell and Sutherland about a sniper who pins a guy down in a phone booth. It sounds preposterous to sustain for the duration of a feature-length film, you say? Think again. "Phone Booth" may be imperfect, its biggest flaws being two unsympathetic main characters and a contrived and far-fetched plot, but that doesn't stop the audience from having a heck of a good time most of the way. It's quite an accomplishment, really, when you consider that Farrell is on screen almost 100% of the time and Sutherland is a disembodied voice.
I didn't have nearly the good time that you did, John, and neither did my wife, who found this film so annoying that she had to leave the room. Though Farrell doesn't hold my interest in the same way that Tom Hanks did in "Cast Away," I didn't mind him being on screen for almost every frame, despite his slipping into two or three different accents during that time. It's the disembodied voice, which sounded more like Kelsey Grammer than Sutherland, that was incredibly annoying. But the B-movie plot, I'll grant you, created and sustained a credible tension.
We're told at the beginning of the movie that despite practically everyone in the greater New York metropolitan area owning a telephone, approximately 4,500,000 people still use phone booths on a regular basis. One of these people is publicist Stu Shepard, a married man who daily uses the last remaining old-fashioned phone booth in the city for calls to his girlfriend, Pam (Katie Holmes). He calls at same time every day from a place he feels his wife (Radha Mitchell) will never find evidence on the phone bills. It's a booth in busy, downtown Manhattan, about to be retired and replaced by a ubiquitous telephone kiosk. But today it's all Stu's, his privacy secure. That is, until a sniper targets him for his personal amusement.
High above the phone booth, hidden in one of a thousand windows, is a madman with a high-powered rifle and a telescopic lens, a man who knows Stu's every move and has rigged up the booth with all manner of gizmos to get and keep Stu's attention. He's never met Stu, but he's researched him and hates what he represents: a fast-talking schemer, a conceited ladies' man, and an unfaithful husband. It's enough for the sniper to call Stu at the booth and then keep him there with the promise of a bullet through his head if he dares leave. If Stu hangs up or steps out of the booth, it's good-bye, Stu. Those few square feet suddenly become for the duration of the movie Stu's whole world, his whole life.
Does the killer mean what he says? "Stu," the sniper tells him, "I never kid." And then he blows away a pimp who's come to claim the phone booth for one of his girls. The police arrive, finding Stu in the booth and the dead body outside, and assume Stu is a murderer.
That's the whole situation in a nutshell, set up in the first few minutes of the picture and continuing for the remainder of the film. The sniper is a self-appointed vigilante who finds Stu guilty of "inhumanity" to his fellow man. Forest Whitaker plays a policeman, Captain Ramey, who has to figure out what's going on and what to do. Before long, Stu's become famous, because not only does half the NYC blue show up but so do the television cameras. Yet Stu can't explain why he won't leave the booth or what's happening to him, lest the unknown, unseen sniper put a bullet through him.
The situation is tense, scary, and gripping throughout, even if the whole affair is too incredible to believe. It's to the film's credit, however, that it doesn't give one enough time to consider the logic until it's over, by which time you don't care because it's been so entertaining.
Yeah, let's talk about the logic. I frankly had a hard time with the basic assumption: that a guy who uses a pay phone to call a would-be lover so his wife won't be able to see the number on his cell phone wouldn't just walk away from a voice like that. Hang up. Answering the phone might be a compulsion, but who keeps listening and gives a smarmy-voiced guy a chance to even set his plan in motion? And I found the "cleansing" vigilante a tiresome cliché. We've seen these guys kill prostitutes, bash gays, and threaten whole planets. It's so familiar that you can't help but turn your attention to other things . . . or be annoyed by the constant droning of that disembodied voice, which gets to be more tedious than your worst phone solicitor nightmare. We won't even talk about how predictable that O. Henry trick ending was.
I did have a few quibbles, though, that nagged me during and after the picture. Most important, was it really necessary to make both leads so repellant? It goes without saying that the sniper is a lunatic, a serial killer who's done this kind of thing before; we're not supposed to have any heart for him. He is virtually never seen, and Sutherland projects in his voice exactly the right degree of slimy menace to make him totally repulsive. Indeed, it is Sutherland who practically steals the show, he's so mesmerizing, a little like the old-time "Shadow."
But Farrell's character is almost equally offensive. Stu is the kind of guy who gives PR a bad name: a lying, cheating, conniving, self-centered young jerk without a care in the world for anybody but himself. Frankly, for most of the picture, we don't feel enough for him to care whether he lives or dies. Indeed, I'd be willing to bet that a lot of folks in the audience would like to see him blown away regardless. Worse, there's a reason for Stu's being such a total creep, and when it's revealed, it's almost as bad as our not knowing.
I also had issues with the movie's ending; with the police captain's extraneous problems with a department negotiator; with the director's over-reliance on split screens and multi-angles; and with the fact that the plot runs out of steam about two-thirds of the way through, making the film probably too long even for its brief eighty-one minutes. Still, it's a good time while it lasts.
I'll grant that what began as a stylish opening--a kind of New York medley of cell phone use, with the people Farrell talks to appearing in a small rectangular pop-up screen--turned into an overly familiar device that, by the story's end, felt gimmicky. I also felt that the whole idea of this guy taking his ring off while talking to a would-be lover in a phone booth was just a little strained, and I objected to the way the script deteriorated, near the end, to a kind of cheesy version of "Sophie's Choice."
The story is the brainchild of writer Larry Cohen, hitherto known for B-movie and schlock horror flicks like "Maniac Cop" and "It's Alive." With "Phone Booth," however, Cohen is right on target and hits the mark, if you'll excuse the expression. It's still B-movie material, mind you, but it's good B-movie material, elevating the substance of this film well beyond anything we have had any right to expect from the genre.
At least we agree on one thing. This is a B-movie, for sure. And it relies on melodrama way too much for me to think of it as anything but a wrong number.
Video:
The 1080p HD picture (2.35:1 aspect ration, transferred to a 25GB disc using MPEG-2 technology at 26MBPS) looks great, with all kinds of sharp detail, even on fast-walking pedestrians where different colors might have caused a slight blurring. There isn't as much color saturation as you'd normally see, but much of that is undoubtedly the result of atmospheric conditions. The film was shot mostly outdoors in natural light, and in a phone booth with existing light.
Audio:
"Phone Booth" has a vibrant soundtrack, with the featured option English DTS HD 5.1 Master Lossless Audio and additional options in Spanish and French Dolby Digital 5.1 Surround. Subtitles are in English and Spanish. You have to give credit to the audio technicians, because they managed to convey the full sense of metropolitan street noise while also maintaining control over the sound.
Extras:
Schumacher provides a low-key director's commentary in which he doesn't seem to notice any of the film's flaws. Other than that, there's only a theatrical trailer in Hi Def.
Parting Thoughts/Bottom Line:
"Phone Booth" is, without a doubt, little more than an amusement-park joy ride, but what an enjoyable ride it is! With the sure hand of a capable director and the exceptionally fine performances of its three principal actors, the film is one of the edgiest, most exciting dramas to come along in a while. In short, "Phone Booth" is a great call.
Great call, or wrong number? For me, it came closer to an annoying phone solicitor who talks in a quasi-seductive voice while trying to mask his heavy breathing. Farrell does a good job with his role, and Forest Whitaker does more with his 15 minutes of "Phone Booth" fame than either Katie Holmes or Radha Mitchell. The director was, indeed, capable, though he went a little overboard with the camera effects. It's the script and the cheesy melodrama that bring the film down. There's tension, sure, but a most familiar and predictable variety.
From filmmaker Joel Schumacher, who directed Colin Farrell in "Tigerland" (2000) and Kiefer Sutherland in "The Lost Boys" (1987) and "Flatliners" (1990), comes this 2002 thriller starring Farrell and Sutherland about a sniper who pins a guy down in a phone booth. It sounds preposterous to sustain for the duration of a feature-length film, you say? Think again. "Phone Booth" may be imperfect, its biggest flaws being two unsympathetic main characters and a contrived and far-fetched plot, but that doesn't stop the audience from having a heck of a good time most of the way. It's quite an accomplishment, really, when you consider that Farrell is on screen almost 100% of the time and Sutherland is a disembodied voice.
I didn't have nearly the good time that you did, John, and neither did my wife, who found this film so annoying that she had to leave the room. Though Farrell doesn't hold my interest in the same way that Tom Hanks did in "Cast Away," I didn't mind him being on screen for almost every frame, despite his slipping into two or three different accents during that time. It's the disembodied voice, which sounded more like Kelsey Grammer than Sutherland, that was incredibly annoying. But the B-movie plot, I'll grant you, created and sustained a credible tension.
We're told at the beginning of the movie that despite practically everyone in the greater New York metropolitan area owning a telephone, approximately 4,500,000 people still use phone booths on a regular basis. One of these people is publicist Stu Shepard, a married man who daily uses the last remaining old-fashioned phone booth in the city for calls to his girlfriend, Pam (Katie Holmes). He calls at same time every day from a place he feels his wife (Radha Mitchell) will never find evidence on the phone bills. It's a booth in busy, downtown Manhattan, about to be retired and replaced by a ubiquitous telephone kiosk. But today it's all Stu's, his privacy secure. That is, until a sniper targets him for his personal amusement.
High above the phone booth, hidden in one of a thousand windows, is a madman with a high-powered rifle and a telescopic lens, a man who knows Stu's every move and has rigged up the booth with all manner of gizmos to get and keep Stu's attention. He's never met Stu, but he's researched him and hates what he represents: a fast-talking schemer, a conceited ladies' man, and an unfaithful husband. It's enough for the sniper to call Stu at the booth and then keep him there with the promise of a bullet through his head if he dares leave. If Stu hangs up or steps out of the booth, it's good-bye, Stu. Those few square feet suddenly become for the duration of the movie Stu's whole world, his whole life.
Does the killer mean what he says? "Stu," the sniper tells him, "I never kid." And then he blows away a pimp who's come to claim the phone booth for one of his girls. The police arrive, finding Stu in the booth and the dead body outside, and assume Stu is a murderer.
That's the whole situation in a nutshell, set up in the first few minutes of the picture and continuing for the remainder of the film. The sniper is a self-appointed vigilante who finds Stu guilty of "inhumanity" to his fellow man. Forest Whitaker plays a policeman, Captain Ramey, who has to figure out what's going on and what to do. Before long, Stu's become famous, because not only does half the NYC blue show up but so do the television cameras. Yet Stu can't explain why he won't leave the booth or what's happening to him, lest the unknown, unseen sniper put a bullet through him.
The situation is tense, scary, and gripping throughout, even if the whole affair is too incredible to believe. It's to the film's credit, however, that it doesn't give one enough time to consider the logic until it's over, by which time you don't care because it's been so entertaining.
Yeah, let's talk about the logic. I frankly had a hard time with the basic assumption: that a guy who uses a pay phone to call a would-be lover so his wife won't be able to see the number on his cell phone wouldn't just walk away from a voice like that. Hang up. Answering the phone might be a compulsion, but who keeps listening and gives a smarmy-voiced guy a chance to even set his plan in motion? And I found the "cleansing" vigilante a tiresome cliché. We've seen these guys kill prostitutes, bash gays, and threaten whole planets. It's so familiar that you can't help but turn your attention to other things . . . or be annoyed by the constant droning of that disembodied voice, which gets to be more tedious than your worst phone solicitor nightmare. We won't even talk about how predictable that O. Henry trick ending was.
I did have a few quibbles, though, that nagged me during and after the picture. Most important, was it really necessary to make both leads so repellant? It goes without saying that the sniper is a lunatic, a serial killer who's done this kind of thing before; we're not supposed to have any heart for him. He is virtually never seen, and Sutherland projects in his voice exactly the right degree of slimy menace to make him totally repulsive. Indeed, it is Sutherland who practically steals the show, he's so mesmerizing, a little like the old-time "Shadow."
But Farrell's character is almost equally offensive. Stu is the kind of guy who gives PR a bad name: a lying, cheating, conniving, self-centered young jerk without a care in the world for anybody but himself. Frankly, for most of the picture, we don't feel enough for him to care whether he lives or dies. Indeed, I'd be willing to bet that a lot of folks in the audience would like to see him blown away regardless. Worse, there's a reason for Stu's being such a total creep, and when it's revealed, it's almost as bad as our not knowing.
I also had issues with the movie's ending; with the police captain's extraneous problems with a department negotiator; with the director's over-reliance on split screens and multi-angles; and with the fact that the plot runs out of steam about two-thirds of the way through, making the film probably too long even for its brief eighty-one minutes. Still, it's a good time while it lasts.
I'll grant that what began as a stylish opening--a kind of New York medley of cell phone use, with the people Farrell talks to appearing in a small rectangular pop-up screen--turned into an overly familiar device that, by the story's end, felt gimmicky. I also felt that the whole idea of this guy taking his ring off while talking to a would-be lover in a phone booth was just a little strained, and I objected to the way the script deteriorated, near the end, to a kind of cheesy version of "Sophie's Choice."
The story is the brainchild of writer Larry Cohen, hitherto known for B-movie and schlock horror flicks like "Maniac Cop" and "It's Alive." With "Phone Booth," however, Cohen is right on target and hits the mark, if you'll excuse the expression. It's still B-movie material, mind you, but it's good B-movie material, elevating the substance of this film well beyond anything we have had any right to expect from the genre.
At least we agree on one thing. This is a B-movie, for sure. And it relies on melodrama way too much for me to think of it as anything but a wrong number.
Video:
The 1080p HD picture (2.35:1 aspect ration, transferred to a 25GB disc using MPEG-2 technology at 26MBPS) looks great, with all kinds of sharp detail, even on fast-walking pedestrians where different colors might have caused a slight blurring. There isn't as much color saturation as you'd normally see, but much of that is undoubtedly the result of atmospheric conditions. The film was shot mostly outdoors in natural light, and in a phone booth with existing light.
Audio:
"Phone Booth" has a vibrant soundtrack, with the featured option English DTS HD 5.1 Master Lossless Audio and additional options in Spanish and French Dolby Digital 5.1 Surround. Subtitles are in English and Spanish. You have to give credit to the audio technicians, because they managed to convey the full sense of metropolitan street noise while also maintaining control over the sound.
Extras:
Schumacher provides a low-key director's commentary in which he doesn't seem to notice any of the film's flaws. Other than that, there's only a theatrical trailer in Hi Def.
Parting Thoughts/Bottom Line:
"Phone Booth" is, without a doubt, little more than an amusement-park joy ride, but what an enjoyable ride it is! With the sure hand of a capable director and the exceptionally fine performances of its three principal actors, the film is one of the edgiest, most exciting dramas to come along in a while. In short, "Phone Booth" is a great call.
Great call, or wrong number? For me, it came closer to an annoying phone solicitor who talks in a quasi-seductive voice while trying to mask his heavy breathing. Farrell does a good job with his role, and Forest Whitaker does more with his 15 minutes of "Phone Booth" fame than either Katie Holmes or Radha Mitchell. The director was, indeed, capable, though he went a little overboard with the camera effects. It's the script and the cheesy melodrama that bring the film down. There's tension, sure, but a most familiar and predictable variety.
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