A ringing phone has to be answered," the narrator of Phone Booth reminds us. Is it curiosity that drives Stu Shepard (Colin Farrell) to answer that ringing phone again and again instead of hanging it up before the caller threatened to shoot him? Is it curiosity that drove Farrell to sign onto such a mediocre role after a good performance in Minority Report? To test whether someone would stay on the phone after being mind f--ked, I dialed one of the phone booths in the Bryan Center.
Fortunately, Larry Moneta answered, so I had plenty to berate him with.
"Hello, Larry," I said in an ominous voice.
Much like the mystery man (Kiefer Sutherland) haunting Shepard, I taunt Moneta with his past mistakes: "Do you really think people want a student village?" "Do you really think we want you to structure our social lives?" He refuses to take responsibility. He hates being criticized. He hangs up.
Here's the test: After Shepard had been pushed like this, getting him to admit his desire to have an affair with a young starlet (Katie Holmes), he picks up the phone again when it rings. Moneta is slightly smarter, he walks away from the phone, sufficiently creeped out, but none the worse from my verbal assault.
Shepard's decision to pick up the phone the second time is what's supposed to launch the movie into the action/thriller stratosphere the commercials seem to promise. Instead, the movie gets bogged down in hackneyed moralism.
During the second call, the anonymous vigilante confesses he has a sniper rifle aimed at Shepard and is ready to shoot. Through a series of calls, he gives Shepard the chance to confess the two sins that caused the sniper to target him: thinking about having an affair and being rude to people who can't help him get a leg up as a publicist.
Yes, for these terrible sins, a serial vigilante - who already killed a corporate executive for dumping stock and a German kiddie porn director for, well, making German kiddie porn - is targeting Shepard. Basically, it's a ridiculously over-blown reason to kill someone.
The only bright spot in the movie is the trash-talking hookers that try to pry Shepard from the phone booth. But their 10 minutes on the screen isn't enough to be worth your $7.50. Be smart - don't answer the call to see this movie.
- Meg Lawson
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