Action | rated PG-13 (L) | starring Denzel Washington, Chris Pine, Rosario Dawson | directed by Tony Scott | 1:39 mins
Veteren railroad engineer Frank (Denzel Washington) and rookie conductor Will (Chris Pine) find themselves in a unique position to help stop a catastrophe when user error causes an unmanned freight train pulling gallons of toxic chemicals to come barrelling down the track like a missle toward them and their hometown.
Fast, loud, bombastic, full-throttle, explosive and a disaster. Adjectives used to describe the typical Tony Scott movie would also seem to describe the antagonist of his latest loud, fast, bombastic, full-throttle action movie. Unstoppable moves like a runaway freight train. Call it a perfect marriage of director and material. Given a script that doesn’t force the filmmaker to juggle much character drama and has been streamlined into one big long punchy action set piece, Scott focuses his hectic camera and MTV music video editing style on the task at hand – a speeding train on a track – and the result is easily the most fun Scott/Denzel Washington collaboration yet.
I’m actually of two minds on Unstoppable. One one hand the movie lacks any substance. Washington and Pine’s characters are straight from the stock action movie barrel. The working-class guys with trouble at home (Pine an estranged wife, Washington estranged daughters) who swap their backstories in the filler time between action sequences and are suddenly put in a position to be heroes. Like in all of these movies saving the world will prove to their women that they are actually decent guys after all. On the other hand… it really doesn’t need substance. It’s an action movie and a rip-roaring one at that and their light banter is kind of fun. While more substance would have made me love it, that would have been going above and beyond. Appreciated, but not necessary for it to work.
Given how lightly filled in Washington and Pine are as heroes it is smart that Unstoppable actually unfolds more like an ensemble piece than a star vehicle. It’s a film less about two guys playing hero and more about a company that screws up big time and races through the plans and options to fix it before it gets worse. I like that the train in the film isn’t a personified villain, that it’s trecherous course was the result of some very human error on the part of two hapless engineers (Ethan Suplee and T.J. Miller). Every man or woman out there who has screwed up on the job can relate, only in Unstoppable that stress has been magnified up to the point that that screw up is broadcasted on the national news and may cost thousands of lives.
At the center of that supporting ensemble is Rosario Dawson. From the moment she walks onto the screen Dawson runs off with the movie. Her Carolyn is a perfect character for this type of quick, efficient action movie, not burdened down by a dramatic/cliche back story, she is just there to get things done. Dawson’s realistic, tough and passionate performance quickly becomes the center to root for in Unstoppable, whether she is reacting in horror at a botched rescue attempt or frustratingly arguing with the corporate office over how to really solve the problem. She’s just terrific and this movie would not be half of what it is without her full committment.
A high concept call back to set-piece action movies of the 90s (Speed, Sudden Death, Under Siege), Unstoppable is superficial, but entertaining. Tony Scott has tamed his more hallucinagenic camera work this round to make a movie that works less on angry action scenes and more on the problem solving of a crisis. With Dawson in the center of it selling the realism, Unstoppable is a break-neck, cheer-the-heroes thrill ride.