Phone Booth

If a public phone were ringing would you answer it? If you were the self-confessed best publicist in New York and full of confidence like Stu Shepard (Farrell), you could even think that phone call was for you. The thing is that the call is for Stu and a voice on the other end of the line informs him that if he leaves the phone booth he will die.

Colin Farrell finally proves that he is the next big thing by starting in one of the most tense and original thrillers in a very long time.

Real time thriller Phone Booth has you on the edge of your seat as soon as Farrell's Stu answers the phone on that New York street and you are transfixed for the next seventy minutes. Pure tension oozes from the screen as the voice on the phone puts Stu through hell for his own gratification.

It's hard to believe that this movie is from the director of Batman & Robin and Bad Company, Joel Schumacher but this is the good Schumacher, the director that bought us the character driven movies Tigerland, Flawless and Falling Down. It seems that when he is given a challenging subject, a good script and a small budget, Joel Schumacher can produce some extremely good cinema. Whether its because he can't cope with huge budgets or he does have enough control during his bigger projects, we will never know but he should stick to smaller, more character driven movies and he will gain back all the respect he lost during the Batman debacle.

Schumacher aside, this is Colin Farrell's movie. The Irish tearaway excels in the role of Stu Shepard. The character fits his off screen persona exactly. He is cocky, slick, women adore him and men want to be him. Basically he is playing himself with a very good New York accent. Later in the movie as the pressure builds, he has the chance to prove what a great actor he is going to be. His character shows true emotion in an extremely tense and potentially deadly situation. Not many actors would have been able to pull this off. This role will push Farrell into Brad Pitt, Edward Norton and Johnny Depp territory of great young character actors.

Farrell has good on screen support from Forest Whitaker as the police captain on the scene, Radha Mitchell as Stu's wife Kelly and the lovely Katie Holmes as his girlfriend Pamela. It is the voice on the other end of the phone that nearly steals the film away from Farrell however. Kiefer Sutherland has a truly menacing voice and you could have forgotten what a good villain he can be (remember Lost Boys?). His vocal performance could be one of the best unseen screen maniacs in motion pictures. His voice is quite terrifying and you won't be able to watch 24, or anything else he is in without thinking of this performance.

What sets this movie apart from other thrillers is its originality. Nearly all the movie takes place with Stu standing in a phone booth on a New York City street. Now this might not sound very interesting and could be more associated with a stage play on a single set but it works tremendously. Writer Larry Cohen (who is more associated with B-Movies such as It's Alive and Maniac Cop but did write the screenplay for Carrie) keeps the tension so high you don't want to move away from Stu's situation, as you don't care what else is going on. It is absolutely riveting and you can't take your eyes off the screen for a second.

Phone Booth is an instant classic in the Thriller genre. This is the most tense movie I have watched in a very long time. This is edge of your seat stuff and a movie you will be telling your friends about for a very long time. Put it this way, you'll never answer a public phone again.

Audio commentary from director Joel Schumacher, 'Making Of' featurette (28 mins), Trailers, Interactive menu & Scene access

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2003