Movie, "Unstoppable"
Dec. 11th, 2010 11:38 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
elfsOmaha and I went to see Unstoppable, with Denzel Washington and Chris Pine. It hasn't gotten very much press, which is a bit of a shame because it's a very well-done example of its genre.
The basic premise is based [the link contains spoilers!] on a real incident that happened in 2001, when a freight train left a train-yard with no one on board. Another locomotive has to chase down and figure out how to stop it... somehow.
Denzel and Pine play the conductor and engineer of the chase train, and they have great chemistry. In fact, they, Rosario Dawson, Lew Temple, Kevin Corrigan, and Kevin Dunn (although Dunn is very obviously typecast here) all give excellent and full-throated performances. Not a whole lot is being asked of them-- this is a man-vs-mindless-beast film, where the "beast" happens to be a half-million kilos of moving locomotive, after all-- but each does his or her job with verve and attention. Nobody phones it in.
The plot is nothing to write home about. Omaha and I disagreed about the man-vs-man and man-vs-himself aspects of the plot: most of the choices here are in very stark terms, and director Tony Scott isn't really interested in seeing people make the "wrong" decisions; he wants to get on with the various ways people try-- and fail, and succeed-- in stopping the runaway train, and the challenges they face in discovering the crisis and then dealing with it.
Unstoppable is an action/thriller with no obvious need for exceptional special effects; it's more of a stunt film. This is no Michael Bay film. The setting is the mundane world of Southern Pennsylvania, and the camera likes its backdrop almost as much as it likes its actors. Each crisis is a set-piece assembled by a master of the art (Scott also directed The Taking of Pelham 1-2-3, Man on Fire, and Top Gun), and each is filmed carefully and well.
Omaha and I gave it thumbs-up. It's a film worthy of your dime and your time, a satisfying adrenaline rush for a Friday afternoon.
The basic premise is based [the link contains spoilers!] on a real incident that happened in 2001, when a freight train left a train-yard with no one on board. Another locomotive has to chase down and figure out how to stop it... somehow.
Denzel and Pine play the conductor and engineer of the chase train, and they have great chemistry. In fact, they, Rosario Dawson, Lew Temple, Kevin Corrigan, and Kevin Dunn (although Dunn is very obviously typecast here) all give excellent and full-throated performances. Not a whole lot is being asked of them-- this is a man-vs-mindless-beast film, where the "beast" happens to be a half-million kilos of moving locomotive, after all-- but each does his or her job with verve and attention. Nobody phones it in.
The plot is nothing to write home about. Omaha and I disagreed about the man-vs-man and man-vs-himself aspects of the plot: most of the choices here are in very stark terms, and director Tony Scott isn't really interested in seeing people make the "wrong" decisions; he wants to get on with the various ways people try-- and fail, and succeed-- in stopping the runaway train, and the challenges they face in discovering the crisis and then dealing with it.
Unstoppable is an action/thriller with no obvious need for exceptional special effects; it's more of a stunt film. This is no Michael Bay film. The setting is the mundane world of Southern Pennsylvania, and the camera likes its backdrop almost as much as it likes its actors. Each crisis is a set-piece assembled by a master of the art (Scott also directed The Taking of Pelham 1-2-3, Man on Fire, and Top Gun), and each is filmed carefully and well.
Omaha and I gave it thumbs-up. It's a film worthy of your dime and your time, a satisfying adrenaline rush for a Friday afternoon.
