Directed by:
Joel SchumacherScreenplay:
Larry CohenCinematography:
Matthew LibatiqueComposer:
Harry Gregson-WilliamsCast:
Colin Farrell, Kiefer Sutherland, Forest Whitaker, Radha Mitchell, Katie Holmes, Paula Jai Parker, Tia Texada, John Enos III, Richard T. Jones, Keith Nobbs (more)VOD (5)
Plots(1)
Stu Shepard (Colin Farrel) is an arrogant publicist lying his way to success in New York. Everything changes however when he unknowingly answers a call in a phone booth he's been using to cheat on his wife. Now he is at the mercy of the caller (Kiefer Sutherland) who, as an invisible sniper somewhere in the buildings above, is holding him hostage with demands to come clean with his wife (Radha Mitchell) and his girlfriend (Katie Holmes). Relying on his wits and the unlikely help of Capt. Ramey (Forest Whitaker) Stu's life will change even if he does manage to escape alive. This highly original suspense thriller from director Joel Schumacher is filled with action and unbelievable moments when all of New York comes to a standstill for one harrowing conclusion. (20th Century Fox Home Entertainment)
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Reviews (11)
KIEFER RULES! The main star in this inventive thriller for me is not the great Colin Farrell, but the absolutely perfect voice performance of Keifer Shuterland. I wouldn’t want to see this film dubbed. And I also wonder how the video distributors will handle it when converting it to VHS format. Schumacher divides the screen into several windows in which we see the plot running simultaneously from different locations. It's nothing new, but I like this method often used in the 1960s.
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I’m grateful to Telecom/Télefonica O2 for getting rid of the telephone boxes from my neighborhood. I’m such a dummy that I also might pick up a forlorn call. Just that I’m in no way such a hot shot like Farrell. I’d be a darn piece of cake for “that guy". And for this movie is a piece of cake too because everything works as it should and practically all came out unprecedentedly well. Especially the atmosphere. Something that would be hard to find in a regular Prague phone booth.
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"Telephone booth" is still effective even after years, although it may seem that the booth itself is a relic that can only be found in a museum nowadays. It beautifully demonstrates how times evolve. However, it doesn't really matter because even in another 13 years, this will be an immensely powerful and claustrophobic drama, which will still have the same positive effect on the viewer. Joel Schumacher truly excelled in this.
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Even after watching this film twenty times, it's still an inventive, clever, and suspenseful thriller where Joel Schumacher, constrained by budget and shooting days, lets the entire weight of the plot be carried by the polished dialogue of the Farrell-Sutherland pair. For this, the biggest thanks go to Larry Cohen, who did have some mistakes and logical question marks in the script, but the witty social criticism together with the escalation of the plot reliably carries the film for the entire 70-minute runtime.
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By the end of the film, the script didn't seem to know which way to go, so all of a sudden something happened that could have happened at any time, and it was so rushed and just weird that it kind of ruined Phone Booth for me. However, the previous hour was good and I certainly wouldn't want my bad conscience to have the voice of a giggling Kiefer Sutherland.
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