When action compensates for logic

Rating: 3/10 (5 August 2002)

A thriller must be logical all the way down the line. It has to be very well-thought out from a writers standpoint.
If the early scenes are referenced later in the movie, they must be treated logically.
If peoples' lives are on the line, as an audience member you realize that their main purpose in the movie is to move that plot along, that they are devices for the writer, not actually PEOPLE in the best possible sense. In this way, the movie got it fairly right. No one on that bus is anything more than a stereotyped stock character, taken from many an Irwin Allen disasterous background.
The villian should be colorful, have a variety of snide remarks with which to arm himself against the hero, and have a bone to pick with humanity as a whole.
The hero should have at least one expression other than anger, and the leading lady, if there is room for one in the budget, should be asking the illogical questions most of the audience wants an answer to.

It should all add up at the end, it should be accountable to itself.

This is not that movie although it got some things right. Bullock was not yet a star so had little to lose by just being herself. Keanu is so one-note that he looks constipated. Casting Dennis Hopper as a villian is as original as casting Meg Ryan as a bagette-carrying New Yorker with a laptop and a mop-top haircut, who has a lot to give the right guy.

Unfortunately, Jeff Daniels, Glenn Plummer and Joe Morton, previously thought to respect their craft, are along for the ride, too.

One question - how did the bus still run after the gas tank was punctured? Just curious. I have two dozen similar questions, but need an answer to that one first. If that has a decent answer, then maybe its just me alone that expects it all to make some sense. 3/10.