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Phone Booth

Phone Booth

List Price: $14.98
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Rating: 3 stars
Summary: Not Bad, but definitely not that good.
Review: The previews did a good job of making me want to see this movie. So did the box at the local movie store. Little did I realize that I had already seen this movie, but it was called Liberty Stands Still. This movie could have been so much better. Suspense? No. Good story? No. Good actors, not really. The guy in the phone booth is a complete a-hole, so why would you care if he gets killed anyways? Probably doing the world a favor. Kieffer Sutherland's voice was perfect for the guy on the other end of the phone. I can't really say anything else about what works without giving away the whole movie (like that would be a bad thing). I know I'm just rambling here. Bottom line, I'm glad I rented this because I would have been very upset had I paid full movie price at a theater. My girlfriend had trouble staying awake during the movie. I found it fairly interesting, but mostly because I was waiting to see what would happen next that had already been done in Liberty Stands Still. There are lots of similarities. Rent this one. Don't buy it. Because I really doubt you'll have any desire to ever watch it again. Even though this was a "big budget" film, and Liberty Stands Still was a straight to video film, "Liberty" at least had you feel sorry for the lady on the phone, and you also felt for the sniper. You don't give a darn about the guy in the phone booth, and you certainly don't care about the sniper. This movie should have gone straight to video. I've actually seen better "made for cinemax" movies :)

Rating: 3 stars
Summary: Nice performance. Poor production.
Review: New York City's last actual telephone booth with walls stands at 53rd St. and 8th Ave. Stu Shepard (Colin Farrell) is an ambitious publicist who is in the habit of conducting business on his cell phone while walking down 8th Avenue. He stops at that phone booth at the same time every day to call a young client with whom he likes to flirt. One day, as he is finishing up his calls, someone calls him. The phone in the booth rings. Stu answers. The caller doesn't identify himself, but asks that Stu listen while the caller telephones Stu's young client and reveals that Stu is married. The caller also insists that Stu telephone his wife, Kelly (Radha Mitchell), and confess his emotional infidelity to her. When Stu refuses, the caller demonstrates his power by shooting a toy that is on the ground next to the phone booth with a high powered rifle. And the game is on. The caller says that Stu is being punished for lying to his clients, colleagues and his wife. If Stu does not confess his sins and do exactly as the caller says, the caller will kill either Stu or a bystander. When the caller kills a man who is trying to pull Stu from the phone booth, it attracts the attention of the police, who blame Stu for the shooting. Police Captain Ramey (Forest Whitaker) is the senior officer on the scene, and he would like very much to avoid shooting Stu, who refuses to leave the phone booth. Stu must try to communicate to the police that there is a sniper holding him hostage while doing everything he can to prevent the sniper from claiming more victims.

"Phone Booth" has an interesting premise. And Colin Farrell does a good job of conveying the extraordinary stress that Stu in under as he must negotiate for the lives of the bystanders while his own life is constantly threatened by both the sniper and the police. Colin Farrell's performance is the stand-out element of this film. I recommend "Phone Booth" to big Colin Farrell fans for this reason. The ability of the caller to pull off such an elaborate game of extortion is a less credible. But what I really don't like about "Phone Booth" is its production. Director Joel Schumacher's tastes seem to have shifted from the height of overproduced extravagance in 1997's "Batman and Robin" to bargain basement production values in "Phone Booth". This movie just shouts "cheap". And since the production is so self-consciously chintzy, Schumacher thinks he can pass that off as style. Being able to make a good film on a small budget is great. Making a mediocre film that looks like it was made on a shoestring isn't. And what's with those blue filters? This film is blue. Ever since those bluish automobile advertisements became popular a few years ago, Hollywood has embraced the cyan cast far too widely. Even the grungiest neighborhoods in New York don't sport odd color casts, and who would want them to?

Rating: 3 stars
Summary: An original thriller
Review: Phone Booth is not a cheap potboiler; it's an intense, original, well-acted thriller. Sure it's implausible, but show me a thriller that isn't! However, there were some problems: The attack of the pimp and his harem was ridiculous; there was no established connection between Stu and the sniper; Stu was not bad enough or important enough to deserve such attention; the wife and the girlfriend were clueless; and in the end even the sniper comes off as a good guy. Maybe it's a potboiler after all - but it is intense!

Rating: 3 stars
Summary: Dial S For Suspense...
Review: Most people don't know it, but Joel Schumacher is actually quite a talented director. He'll never live down the embarassment of 'Batman & Robin' but since then he has had two films that are top notch productions. 'Tigerland' is one. This is the other. Schumacher and Colin Farrell reteam for the second time (Farrell also starred in 'Tigerland', his breakout role) and really ratchet up the tension with a free-fall thriller that goes for broke at a breakneck pace.
Farrell plays Stu Sheppard, a fast-talking semi-sleazy New York publicist with a doting wife (Radha Mitchell from 'Pitch Black')and a wannabe starlet mistress (Katie Holmes) on the side. One day, as fate would of course have it, Stu picks the wrong phone booth to place a call and before he knows it, a cold and calculating sniper (Keifer Sutherland) has Stu trapped in the booth for his twisted amusement. Eventually the cops show up, headed by the cautious Captain Ramey (Forest Whitaker playing himself). Will Stu get out of this crazy predicament? The answer is obvious if you watch a lot of movies, but getting there is pretty fun.

The story moves incredibly fast at a brisk 80 minutes or so, stopping a scant few times to try to develop some character moments. Even though Stu is a creep, you still sympathize with him and his hopeless situation as he's forced to say and experience things that would cause most people to snap into a major nervous breakdown. There's no time for silly subplots or excess narrative, which is one of the film's strong points.

The performances are at the very least pretty decent. There are some ham-fisted moments among the tension, mostly from Farrell, but he does do a nice job of carrying the picture since he's in virtually 99% of the movie. Keifer Sutherland is sufficiently menacing and acerbic as the mysterious sniper/caller, although he sometimes sounds like Jeremy Irons' character Scar from 'The Lion King'

The ending is well done and doesn't lead to a silly action chase or dumb set-piece where the hero goes after the bad guy, which would have blown the whole movie completely. Congrats to Schumacher for making a small, claustrophobic film with some nice acting. It does have some silly dialogue at times, as well as a few lapses of logic, but it doesn't overstay its welcome and will remain known as a fast, cheap and rather effective exercise in small-scale suspense.

Overall, I'd recommend 'Phone Booth' to anyone looking for a good time at the movies. It's quick, painless and quite entertaining. Aside from a few plotholes and script lags, it's great fun for the thrill-seeker in all of us.

Rating: 4 stars
Summary: Impausibe but taunt and entertaining thriller
Review: "Phone Booth" is a taunt, scary little psychological thriller. It suffers from too many lapses in logic; in fact, it is not at all plausible and depends primarily on style over substance. Still, it a fine piece of filmmaking that stands head and shoulders above recent high profile thrillers such as "Panic Room". Its best assets are a superlative performance by Colin Farrell, brilliant cinematography, and a fast pace that never once meanders into superfluous territory.

The story is simple: A sleazy publicist named Stu [Farrell] is walking with his assistant around midtown Manhattan one afternoon. Both are on cell phones wheeling and dealing. Dismissing his assistant, Stu makes his way to a phone booth, one of the few left in that part of New York. As usual, he is there to call the girl he wants to sleep with. By using a pay phone, he can avoid his wife's seeing the phone number when the cell phone bill arrives. After he hangs up, the pay phone rings. He answers, and a man's voice informs him that Stu better do everything the man tells him to do because the caller has a high powered rifle aimed at him. At first Stu thinks it's a bad joke. It isn't, and what follows is an intense and clever cat and mouse game.

Farrell is able to give the unsavory main character enough humanity to make us care about what happens to him. Kiefer Sutherland does well in an interesting role. Playing the Caller, he is not seen until the end of the movie, and then only for a few seconds.

Those who expect a thriller worthy of Hitchcock will be disappointed. Those expecting a merely entertaining thriller will be pleased.

Rating: 5 stars
Summary: Fantastic
Review: This movie is like Speed in the phone booth. Colin Farrell is one of my favorite actors. The whole movie takes place in one location and he kept me on the edge of my seat the entire time. Jim Carrey would have been terrible in this role. He over acts too much. Colin is one of the best actors in Hollywood at the moment.

Rating: 4 stars
Summary: Taut thriller with shallow plot and good performances
Review: Despite the fact that Phone Booth's release date was postponed time and time again, it is still a more than solid pot boiler that showcases the skills of stars Colin Farrell and Kiefer Sutherland. Farrell plays Stu: a smarmy publicist who, in an attempt to cheat on his wife, uses a phone booth in New York City to contact his young client (Katie Holmes who is wasted in this thankless role). One day Stu picks up the phone when it rings only to be held hostage by a seemingly crazed sniper (Sutherland, whose malicious voice is simply chilling) demanding that Stu confess his sins or he dies. Director Joel Schumacher (the man who ruined the Batman film series) keeps the pace speedy and suspenseful without having the film wear out in it's 80 minute running time. Farrell (in a role originally planned for Jim Carrey) gives a great performance and seems to become more and more of a great actor with each film he does, while Sutherland (whose role was originally slated for Ron Eldard) is fantastic, even if it's only his voice that is performing. Radha Mitchell is wasted as well as Stu's hapless wife, while Forest Whitaker seems a bit out of place as police Captain Ramsey. All that aside however, Phone Booth is a more than solid thriller that is definitely worth checking out.

Rating: 5 stars
Summary: Colin Farrell,Pizza and Panic in a Phonebooth, Priceless
Review: I bought this DVD because I missed it in the theatre and know that Colin Farrell can deliver amazing performances from his past films. I've watched the film six times already and I usually can't sit through most films without a "boredom break". I was bothered by shots that didn't mesh from different angles, but that's worth ignoring to watch the acting throughout.
I thought all the actors chosen were perfect for the roles. Forest Whitaker, John Enos(Leon) and the "hookers" were just killer! It had the feel of those movies I watched growing up when you believed that the movie was shot all in order from start to finish. Watching Colin Farrell's range of emotions and reactions has me in awe of his talent. This is one of those films that I'll watch as many times as I did "The Raiders of the Lost Ark". Harrison Ford's reactions were priceless. Colin Farrell delivers subtly and skillfully an Italian served a pizza and panic in a phonebooth. Worth watching if you enjoy watching actors do what they do best.

Rating: 2 stars
Summary: boring
Review: I thouhgt this movie was very boring and made no sense. stay away from this one

Rating: 4 stars
Summary: if you need a quick movie.......
Review: Okay I saw the previews for this awhile back and couldn't see it in theaters hey now i can. well this movie is about a guy who is the last occupant of that in new york phone booth.[oh really?!] anyways, after refusing a pizza in the phone booth the payphone rings and what else he picks it up! Now he is being held up by a sniper and he has to do exactly what the sniper [ a.k.a. the caller] says or he is shot.

To me this movie has kind of an Alfred Hitchcock endinging. WATCH IT AND FIND OUT.


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