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Phone Booth
When I saw the trailer for this movie I was mistaken on two points.
One, I thought this movie was set in the eighties (the typeface on the poster pointed towards a period piece). It isn’t.
Two, I though it looked like a good movie. It isn’t.
The movie begins with a short lecture on the massive amount of phone usage in modern society, and lets us know that a phone booth on 53rd street is about to receive its last patron.
Cut to Stu, a fast talking city publicist played by the handsome but possibly a bit of a knob Colin Farrell, and his keen young helper who was called , oh I don’t know, Brian or something it doesn’t matter he’s not in it much. Stu is the kind of guy who has a mobile phone almost glued to his ear most of the day, but he uses said phone booth every day to call an attractive young actress he is helping to publicize called Pam (Katie Holmes). The reason he calls this one client from a landline is so that his wife (Kelly) wont see the number on his mobile phone bill, although considering the amount of calls Stu makes his wife would need a team of 6 people working flat out every day to find this number.
Stu makes his usual call to Pam and tries to coax her to a hotel room to fulfill his fantasy of sleeping with her. Whether he would actually go through with the act of adultery is unclear, but he hasn’t told Pam he’s married so we can assume he would, given the chance. He takes off his wedding ring before speaking to Pam so he won’t feel guilty.
After Stu finishes talking to Pam he puts the phone down and it rings, only it isn’t Pam ringing back, it’s a stranger who tells Stu he’s dead if he puts down the receiver. The man proves his intention by picking off a guy who is outside the phone booth. This is the beginning of the drama and pretty much where the films takes a downward turn from which it doesn’t recover.
The problems with this film are several fold. The dialogue is weak, Kiefer Sutherland doesn’t make a convincing baddie, the bits that should make your heart skip a beat, such as the killers revelation that was behind several high profile killings ‘The German Porn King’ and other morally bankrupt citizens, just makes you laugh. The killers moral crusade is surely thrown into doubt when he happily slashes an innocent Pizza man’s throat. Plus, the step from ‘German Porn King / Paedophile’ to fashion obsessive who thinks about other women besides his wife, is a big one. Who was next on the list, a guy who picks his nose?
This is not a terrible movie in the league of 'Die another day', Farrell can act well and it has a nice look, but its ultimately a misfire.
HoBo says "At least it’s short."
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