A blockbuster classic - who'da thunk?!

Rating: 8/10 (12 June 2005)

SPEED
Aspect ratio: 2.39:1 (Panavision)
Sound formats: Dolby Digital / DTS
A ruthless terrorist (Dennis Hopper) plants a bomb inside a bus which is primed to detonate if the vehicle's speed falls below 50mph, and a SWAT team is dispatched to guide it through rush hour traffic.
That rarity in modern American cinema - a high concept bubblegum movie which doesn't insult the audience's intelligence. Episodic in structure, the movie pits Hopper's vengeful psychopath against SWAT member Keanu Reeves (whose career went into overdrive from this point onward), and barely pauses for breath along the way. Debut director (and erstwhile cinematographer) Jan de Bont transforms Graham Yost's modest screenplay into a super-charged thrill-machine, photographed (by Andrzej Bartkowiak) and edited (by John Wright) to perfection, and augmented by some of the best stuntwork and visual effects money can buy. The cast is a ragbag of new faces, old-timers and dependable character actors: Reeves and Hopper dominate the show, while leading lady Sandra Bullock 'makes cute' in a career-making performance, and there's strong support from Jeff Daniels (DUMB & DUMBER) and Joe Morton (THE BROTHER FROM ANOTHER PLANET) in crucial secondary roles. Followed by SPEED 2: CRUISE CONTROL (1997).
NB. A 'sleeper' hit by Hollywood blockbuster standards, the film owes a narrative debt to Junya Sato's Japanese thriller THE BULLET TRAIN (1975), in which a terrorist bomb is primed to explode on board a packed commuter train if it falls below a certain speed. It's possible SPEED was written and produced in complete ignorance of the earlier film, but no one connected with de Bont's version seems willing to address the similarities.