"Unstoppable" has no business being this entertaining of a film. After all, the plot is pretty obvious - a runaway train is eventually stopped by a couple quick-thinking workers before it derails and possibly spills a load with hazardous chemicals. However, this movie had plenty of heart-pounding moments and intense action, with it all feeling entirely plausible. (And that's partly because the movie is based on a real-life runaway train in 2001.)
Denzel Washington (Oscar winner for "Training Day" and "Glory") is our wise, grizzled veteran train engineer, Frank. On this day, he's assigned to work with newcomer conductor, Will (Chris Pine, who played Captain Kirk in the "Star Trek" reboot last year). Almost immediately, Frank makes it clear he's not too pleased with working with rookies like Will, who are taking the jobs of veteran rail workers.
Meanwhile, many miles away, a train employee named Dewey (Ethan Suplee, best known for his role in TV's "My Name Is Earl") hopped out of a train car to flip a switch, thinking he will easily be able to hop back aboard the coasting train, which was going maybe 10 miles in an hour. But, in a "Final Destination" sort of moment, the train's lever falls into throttle, and the train bolts away from Dewey. Workers around him laugh at his stupidity. However, the amusement quickly fades as train officials realize the train's speed has reached 70 mph, and the emergency air brakes aren't working.
My first thought as I watched the movie was, "why don't they just drop someone onto the train from a helicopter?" Luckily, that was one of the first options tried. It just didn't work. Neither did a few other ideas. But Frank has the idea to catch the train from behind, hit the brakes, and slow it down. (I don't think I'm giving too much away; all these plot points are shown in commercials and movie trailers.)
Denzel Washington recently teamed with this director, Tony Scott, in the mediocre train movie "Taking of Pelham 1 2 3." I wasn't a fan of that film, and I admittedly wasn't planning on seeing "Unstoppable" until the good reviews started pouring in. Denzel's Frank character knows seemingly everything there is to know about working the rails, knowing just how much time he has to avoid a collision, or how to catch and stop the train.
The wonderful Rosario Dawson ("Men In Black II," "Clerks II," "Rent") plays the role of Connie, who coordinates all train traffic for the line, and she plays her part well here. Like Denzel Washington's character, Dawson's Connie character is rarely wrong, but she's frequently overruled by bosses who are clueless on how to stop the train.
The highlights here are plenty. The near-misses on the train lines are breath-taking, as are some of the collisions. The scene where a person is dropped down from a helicopter to try and land on the runaway train also was intense. This movie could have been pretty basic, but Tony Scott kept it intense throughout.
Shot on a $100 million budget, "Unstoppable" earned an impressive $42 million worldwide in its first three days at the box office. Top critics at Rottentomatoes[dot]com gave it a stellar 90 percent approval rating. Average movie-goers liked it a lot as well, with 62 percent giving it an "A" grade, and another 25 percent giving it a "B" grade.
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