SPEED
A film review by Michael John Legeros
Copyright 1994 Michael John Legeros
Directed by Jan DeBont
Written by Graham Yost
Cast Keanu Reeves, Dennis Hopper, Sandra Bollock, Joe Morton, and
Jeff Daniels
MPAA Rating "R" (presumably for graphic violence and language)
Running Time Approx. 110 minutes
==
"This is the wrong bus."
- unnamed passenger on bus.
Can you really take "too far" too far? The producers of SPEED don't think so.
Audacious action doesn't get any better than SPEED, a non-stop nail-biter about a SWAT-team specialist (Reeves), a brilliant bomber (Hopper), and a bus rigged to blow when it slows below 50. Cross DIE HARD with AIRPORT and you're got the idea.
SPEED stars Keanu Reeves, trying to look tough after his recent upgrade from Most Excellent to Most Enlightened. The dude can't do drama, no duh, but he's nimble enough for the job. (From BUDDHA to Bruce and he even does his own stunts!) Bullock is a better bet as the poor passenger with driving duties. She showed her strength in DEMOLITION MAN and, here, she's the best bargain on board.
Dennis Hopper plays Dennis Hopper, chewing on scenery while spitting out sentences like "Do not attempt to grow a brain." (Good advice if there ever *was* any.) Bill Pullman-lookalike Jeff Daniels has a modestly meaty role as The Partner, while TERMINATOR 2 alumni Joe Morton plays the commanding officer.
The script, by Graham Yost, has enough humor to keep you smiling while you're sweating. Even better: the story never turns Reeves into a wisecracking hero. Thank you for small favors.
Of course, the best bursts of SPEED are those without words.
First-time director Jan DeBont--a former cinematographer who handled such heavies as LETHAL WEAPON 3--gets everything right, from the credits to the close. And those details! Watch for the reflection of a burning bus on a pay phone. Or a banner beside Reeves that reads "To avoid personal injury, do not stand in stepwell."
As the stunts get bigger, the film only gets better. Collisions, explosions, and big-things-sent-flying. Even the throwaway stunts are spectacular. Blink and someone's stepping from a speeding vehicle. Blink and someone's dangling from an elevator car.
Implausible-as-hell, but it works.
Credit a pace that keeps you from thinking; credit some stunts that just can't be faked. Let ILM just *try* to duplicate the simplicity of Reeves really jumping from car onto a moving bus.
(If nothing else, SPEED is a *great* exercise in wish fulfillment. Who *hasn't* wished that they could barrel a bus around slow drivers and through busy intersections?)
SPEED could be reduced. Earlier scenes run a bit too long and the ending is clearly too much. But, that's the joke. The producers know that *everything* in the film is too much and so they damn the torpedos and take over-the-top right over-the-top.
Nitpickers can enjoy the plot-holes, while the more, ahem, "retentive" viewers will have a field day finding the continuity errors that occur in nearly every scene.
Except for the ending, all technical credits are tops. Obvious minatures and mangy mattes undercut the film's next-to-last scene. But, by that point, who cares? SPEED is a full-scale tinkertoy set that makes the beginning of THE FUGITIVE look like a little Lionel train.
Twenty years ago, SPEED would've starred Charleton Heston, and Karen Black, and George Kennedy. No guns would've been needed--but a plane would crash, and a nun would sing, and the girl would get kissed at the end.
But this is the Nineties and, with DIE HARD dollars still fresh on the brain, set-piece *is* plot. Add some fireworks, and blow a few bombs, and it's Jennings Lang all over again.
BOTTOM LINE: The best ride of the summer, so far, is SPEED. Fast,
funny, and furiously far-fetched, this ballsey no-brainer
is the best reason, to date, to avoid public
transportation. Bring extra deodorant.
Grade: A-
.
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