Phone Booth
Published 2017-05-07
Film info
- Title Phone Booth
- Director Joel Schumacher
- Year 2002
- Run time 1hr 21m
- Genres Mystery, Crime, Thriller
- Tagline No options, no lies, no fear, no deals, just keep talking
- Cast Colin Farrell, Kiefer Sutherland, Forest Whitaker, Katie Holmes
Stuart Shepard is a somewhat sleazy publicist who uses an outdoor phone booth to call his girlfriend because his wife keeps tabs on his cell phone bills. But when Stu answers the phone in the phone booth, the terror begins. Now it's a real-time race against the clock as Stu must outwit a psychotic sniper in a frantic scramble from phone booth to freedom.
Live blog
| Time | Comment |
|---|---|
| 1:06 | The whole satellite and technology situation hasn't really aged well. |
| 3:03 | Love to know what the payphone usage stats are now. |
| 6:18 | "Well, you know what they say, the higher a monkey climbs the more you see of his a**." |
| 8:51 | Oof, the PR life is an exhausting one. |
| 11:12 | Katie is Pam! |
| 13:26 | Amazing that he's still on the offensive despite the creepy phone call. |
| 15:11 | Agent and publicist, I guess there's got to be some crossover there. |
| 16:32 | "Because he said it's quiet." "Pam, that's just stupid." |
| 21:14 | The toy robot is cute, spinning around. |
| 25:09 | His scary version of 'if you have to ask, I'm not going to tell you.' |
| 29:25 | "You are guilty of inhumanity to your fellow man." |
| 33:27 | You really wouldn't stick around to make a phone call. |
| 37:42 | Argh the Miranda rights. |
| 40:23 | Really didn't take long for the media to get there. |
| 41:18 | "You're gonna hit the whole alphabet, Stu." |
| 51:44 | This does seem like less of a crime than the other two he killed. |
| 55:43 | They don't still paint white outlines on the floor do they? |
| 1:00:47 | "Don't look up." |
| 1:05:07 | I really like the captain. Nice, thoughtful policeman. |
| 1:08:17 | Stunning acting job from Colin, with not much to play off but a phone. |
| 1:11:51 | The wife is fab. "I only want to talk about what you want to tell me." |
Thoughts
I've seen this one before, perhaps a couple of times, but still couldn't quite remember the finer details when watching it. It's the perfect film to squeeze in when you're short on time, because the actual action is only about 70 minutes, and the rest is all credits.
Although there are a few shots of dodgy old mobile phones, for the most part, the concept of this still stands up, although I do wonder how long that will be the case. There is the odd phone booth still around, but it surely will not be that way forever.
In the meantime, I really enjoyed the tension and the drama of the entire situation, impressive given that it all takes place within a tiny glass box. I'd never really noticed how impressive Colin Farrell's work was in this before. Trivia suggests he had someone on the end of the phone, but even so, it's not much to work with when you're delivering heartwrenching speeches about what an awful person you are. Really well done. And it has a creepy ending too, so there's not much to dislike!
Rating: 4 / 5