| The
Review: |
There's nothing more frustrating
than seeing an inkling of brilliance squandered by a truckload
of tripe. "Phone Booth" begins with so much potential, and
carries that potential onward with assurance and stability.
It has a unique tension that winds tighter and tighter, like
a rubber band stretched to its limits. But think of when the
elastic finally snaps, how it stings as it makes contact with
the skin, and you'll understand what I'm talking about when
I say that the ending for Joel Schumacher's ultimately-average
thriller is one giant limp noodle. ***
The film stars Hollywood bad boy
Colin Farrell as Stuart Shepard, a fast-talking, hot-shot
New York City publicist who spends his days making calls on
multiple cellular phones to various contacts, putting out
bogus information to sources and stringing clients along with
no intention of delivering on his promises. He is insulting
and rude to those he is unfamiliar with, and is no stranger
to the arrogant stature of the everyday ten-foot-tall, bulletproof
man. He is married to Kelly (Radha Mitchell), but we know
that their marriage has reached a point of convenience over
comfort; why else would he be making calls to his mistress,
Pam (Katie Holmes), from a payphone, which happens to be one
of the only phone booths left in the Big Apple? ***
One day, it's business as usual,
until he steps into the phone booth, makes his usual call,
only to hang nup and receive an incoming call from a stranger
who remains unnamed as he pins Stu down in the booth with
warning after warning. "Don't even think about leaving that
booth," he says, cocking his sniper rifle, and taunting his
prey with the red dot of the laser rifle sight; thinking he's
in control of the situation, Stu leaves the booth, only to
find himself back in again. Then things get hectic: a pimp
falls under the predator's bullet, and his hookers name Stu
as the guilty party to the arriving police. Being ordered
to exit the booth by the NYPD, and receiving warnings from
the other end of the line to remain, Stu soon finds himself
tied up in a killer's game of show-and-tell. ***
With a running time of only 82 minutes,
"Phone Booth" wastes no time in getting to the good stuff.
Director Schumacher can now officially be forgiven for "Bad
Company;" working from a script by Larry Cohen, he employs
a distinct visual style that adds gritty surrealism to the
proceedings, and the cinematography from Matthew Libatique
(you may remember his work from Darren Aronofsky's "Pi" and
"Requiem for a Dream") employs a screen division technique
that keeps our focus on multiple parts of the action without
ever taking our attention away from the increasingly unstable
Stu. We see the plight of the people watching the man, as
well as the man himself, and that adds a great deal of intensity
and intimacy to the material. ***
In most cases, though, it is Farrell
who brings the most life to the film, giving a true gutpunch
of a performance that is as real as the beads of sweat seen
with perfect clarity on his worried face. But he is playing
a character in whom the filmmakers are attempting to inject
some form of morality, when he needs none. I'm reminded of
Flannery O'Connor's short story "A Good Man is Hard to Find,"
in which an old woman resorts to hypocricy in order to relate
to her future murderer. Where the filmmakers here could have
taken a similar route, they choose the safe way out. That's
the first major problem with "Phone Booth," it's need to supply
its audience a character that we can root for in the end.
Why do we need to see Stu turn into a morality lesson rather
than have him remain the bastard that he is? ***
And this might have actually worked
if the film didn't rely on a surprise ending that is as rote
and dissatisfying as day-old toast with week-old butter. It's
too chicken to give us something real, something unfamiliar
and unexpected... something original. "Phone Booth" could
have been a striking examination of the consequences of man's
inhumanity to his fellow man; if only Schumacher and Cohen
would have been able to see that, then they may have had a
solid hit to their credit. Instead, we are left with an average
piece of tension-filled entertainment that has one too many
hang-ups and ultimately loses its connection.
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| Image
and Sound |
Given all
of Schumacher's visual tricks, the transfer for "Phone Booth"
presents a bit of a challenge to review. The source print
is awash with film grain, while the film's abstract look features
washed-out colors and overly-dark exteriors. Shadwo detail
and contrast are good if a bit flawed, while edges are somewhat
soft in places, but overall pleasing. There are some visible
compression artifacts that perhaps could have been eliminated
by getting rid of the fullframe transfer, but in summation,
this is a transfer that serves the movie quite well. ***
And speaking
of serving the movie, the audio track is even better. Mastered
in Dolby Digital 5.1, this track has a lot of fun with the
visual tricks of the image, placing multiple layers of dialogue
within various speakers, while at the same time engaging the
entire soundfield with lots of gimmicky effects. It sounds
really good, nicely balanced throughout, and efficient.
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