BEFORE: Tonight, a film about a terrorist act in Times Square, for no particular reason. Linking from "Law Abiding Citizen" is almost too easy, since Jamie Foxx was in "Miami Vice" with Colin Farrell (last seen in "Minority Report").
THE PLOT: A publicist finds himself trapped in a phone booth, pinned down by an extortionist's sniper rifle.
AFTER: Well, someone (Joel Schumacher?) sure doesn't like publicists, or realizes them as the phonies they can be.
Like last night's film, this is about a man using violence to impose his sense of right and wrong on the world. He watches people, figures out their sins, and uses that knowledge to make them confess at gunpoint. Again, the level of planning and foresight needed to carry something like this out stretches the boundaries of what's believable - but isn't that what movies are supposed to do?
It's interesting to note that this film idea was pitched to Alfred Hitchcock in the 1960's, but the writer couldn't find enough motivation to keep the character inside the phone booth. It's also interesting to note that the film's running time is just 80 minutes - I'm guessing that's as long as the suspense of the situation could be maintained. Kudos for realizing that, and keeping the film's length relatively short.
More than 90 minutes without a change of scene, and audiences would be squirming in their seats.
I'm usually pretty good about picking out voices, I can listen to car commercials and identify actors like Laurence Fishburne (Cadillac), Robert Downey Jr. (Nissan) and Jeff Bridges (Hyundai). It can be a helpful talent in my line of work - but I failed to identify the actor playing the mystery caller here. My best guess was Willem Dafoe - close perhaps, but wrong.
Also starring Kiefer Sutherland (Ah! makes sense...last seen in "A Time to Kill")), Forest Whitaker (last seen in "The Color of Money"), Radha Mitchell (last seen in "Surrogates"), Katie Holmes (last seen in "The Ice Storm"), with a cameo from Ben Foster (last seen in "The Messenger").
RATING: 3 out of 10 magazine covers
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